In the book How to take smart notes is suggested that the permanent notes should:

• be divided one for each idea and be formulated so they can be understood on their own to make it easier to understand it later.
• do not be organised by topic to allow to link the ideas to various topics and not restricting himself to a single topic. However a note can be used to write an overview of a topic.
• be linked to related notes.
• fit onto one screen and there should be no need to scrolling.

Related Questions:

Related Topics:

• How to take notes
• Questions to write a permanent note

References

• How to take smart notes | 2017 | Sönke Ahrens

In the book How to take smart notes is suggested to ask oneself the following question to define the notes index:

• In which context will I want to find the note again?

Moreover the index should:

• include a short phrase just near to the note link that indicates what the note contains.

Related Questions:

Related Topics:

• How to take notes

References

• How to take smart notes | 2017 | Sönke Ahrens

I may agree that having a single note for each idea can be useful, however I think that may be some drawbacks in writing a single note for each idea as suggested here. I think that in this way one may lose the overall view of the concepts and topics one is learning. I think that one should continuously switch from a detailed view of a concept (zoom in) to a overall view of a concept (zoom out) to learn something. I think that one could get both using:

It seems to me that effectiveness and efficiency are two main purposes of every method or technique used to improve in something. For example:

• Feynman Technique is a way to increase the effectiveness of our learning.
• Writing bibliographic notes is a way to increase efficiency in retrieving information in our notes taking system.
• Some Principles of Getting Things Done is to increase the efficiency in process tasks (see Why Getting Things Done should work)

Related Questions:

Related Topics:

• Personal growth

References

The Feynman technique is a method to learn something. It consists in writing what we know about a topic in our own words as we would teaching it to a child. If we struggle to explain it in simple words or we are stuck with some concepts, it means that we have not truly understood the topic and therefore we need to study it more.

Related Questions:

Related Topics:

• Zettelkasten
• Test yourself to learn

References

In the book How to take smart notes the author reports that Luhmann, one of the main users of the Zettelkasten method, wrote the notes in this separated way:

• make temporary notes that are notes taken when an idea or interesting thought arise. They should be reviewed at least one time per day to move them on the following permanent notes.
• write the bibliographic information that are the information reported with the same words as they are read or listened. I think that the reason to report the bibliographic information is to quickly come back to the original sources of a concept so one can review who claimed it and what are the arguments that sustained it.
• write some brief permanent notes (not more than one page each) in his own words about the content, his ideas, comments and thoughts. This step is like a Feynman Technique.
• write the project notes that are notes related only to a specific project.
• write a note called index that is a collection of notes links related to specific topics. These are entry points of a topic or line of thoughts and allow to easily find the notes later.

Related Questions:

• Single note for each idea and overall view

Related Topics:

• Zettelkasten
• Feynman Technique
• Effectiveness and Efficiency
• How to take permanent notes
• How to write a notes index
• How to write project notes
• Questions to write a permanent note

References

• How to take smart notes | 2017 | Sönke Ahrens