Guide / Knowledge management

Zettelkasten and Obsidian for researchers

We pile up papers, highlights and notes that we then never find or look at again. The Zettelkasten method, popularised by Sonke Ahrens in How to Take Smart Notes, proposes the opposite: a system of connected notes that not only stores what you read, but helps you generate new ideas. Here is the essence and how I apply it to research.

This is the essentials, the framework I use, not a treatise. Just enough to start well and not waste time. The detail of your own case is what we work through in mentoring.

The underlying idea: notes connect

The heart of the method is simple: an isolated note loses meaning. The value is in the connections between ideas. Instead of filing notes in folders you never open again, you link them to each other, so that walking through your own notes you discover relationships you had not seen. As the original idea put it: everything is connected, and the system only works if it reflects that.

Three kinds of notes

• Fleeting notes. What you capture on the fly: an idea in a talk, something that occurs to you. Temporary, you process them and throw them away.
• Literature notes. What you extract from what you read, in your own words, not copying. The effort of rephrasing is what makes you understand.
• Permanent notes. The worked-through, self-contained ideas you link to the rest of your system. These are the ones that, over time, become papers, talks or projects.

Why Obsidian

Obsidian fits the method because it works with plain-text files linked to each other, without tying you to a company or a closed format. You see the graph of your ideas, you jump from one note to another through its links, and the system grows with you. The tool matters less than the habit, but it helps when it does not get in the way.

The mistake that kills the system

Collecting for the sake of collecting. If you only save and highlight but never rephrase in your own words or connect, you have a dead warehouse, not a Zettelkasten. The rule: every note that comes in, you write it, and you link it to something. Without connection and without your own effort, it generates nothing. Take the path of least resistance you actually use, not the perfect system you abandon in a month.