Subject: Vim + wiki to take and organize notes ?

[setog3]

Hi,

I am starting a PhD and I need a tool to take notes and organize
them. My
editor is vim since a while, so why not using vim for this. To
organize my
notes, I was thinking of a wiki; so I try the viki script, which works
fine,
but I want to know what do you think about it? Should I use a real
wiki, and
edit each page with vim ? Should I continue to viki ? Something else
(wikipediafs,zim editor, another text based wiki : dokuwiki, moinmoin
wiki, hatta ?) ?

What I don't like with viki is the inability to make a real wiki
editable with
a browser from the files, and vice-versa. (if I edit a page with my
browser,
how to update the viki files ?)
In a first time, I don't really need this feature, but in a second
time, if I
want to exchange this note with my director, would be great if he can
comment
some part of the note with a web browser.


Here is a sample of how I work :

What I do, is for example, taking notes at a reunion like :
- we speak about this stuff.; and..
- todo : read the paper by bla about blabla
- send mail to .. bla etc..

after that, I read the paper, and take note about it : resume : it
really speak
about bla with bla bla.; I like the way.. the file is here :
http://bla.com/blabla.pdf

and after that, I write a paper using latex, and need to cite the
different
papers that I read (I use latex + bibtex for this).


So how do you do for managing this kind of things, how to organize
it ? (for
each papers should I do a file that contain my note about it, the
bibtex entry,
and a link to the pdf ?)

And a more out of ml topic :
- Do you know some guide to organize your work specially during a
phd ?
- Do you know a good spell and grammar checker (running under linux)
for
english (I have a really low english level) ?

Thx in advance

--
setog3

[Stahlman Family]

setog3 wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am starting a PhD and I need a tool to take notes and organize
> them. My
> editor is vim since a while, so why not using vim for this. To
> organize my
> notes, I was thinking of a wiki; so I try the viki script, which works
> fine,
> but I want to know what do you think about it? Should I use a real
> wiki, and
> edit each page with vim ? Should I continue to viki ? Something else
> (wikipediafs,zim editor, another text based wiki : dokuwiki, moinmoin
> wiki, hatta ?) ?

There are many solutions for this, each with its advantages and
disadvantages. One possible solution is to use Hari Krishna Dara's
"Notes" plugin to manage and search your notes...
http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2732

...and the "Txtfmt" plugin...
http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2208

...to highlight them. Txtfmt provides a sort of "rich text" capability
(foreground/background colors, bold, underline, italic, etc...).
Alternatively, since the Notes plugin allows you to configure the
filetype to whatever you like, you could use some sort of wiki markup
language to highlight your notes. Others may be more familiar with some
of the wiki-based solutions...

Brett Stahlman

.
.
.

[Tom Link]

> so I try the viki script, which works fine

> [...]

> What I don't like with viki is the inability to make a real wiki
> editable with a browser from the files, and vice-versa.

IMHO you have 3 options:

#1
Put all text files on a shared folder both you and your director/
supervisor have access to and edit them with vim. In this scenario,
viki (or a similar plugin) would be ok.

#2
Use a plain text server-based wiki like dokuwiki. You could then sync
the plain text files on the server with your local copies but still be
able to edit them via a browser. There are a few dokuwiki plugins
around that convert dokuwiki markup to something else.

#3
Use a web-based wiki only. If you use firefox, you could use
extensions like ViewSourceWith to edit the file with vim -- and use an
appropriate syntax style.

> and after that, I write a paper using latex, and need to cite the

> different that I read (I use latex + bibtex for this).

If you use viki, you could also use the deplate converter which
converts viki markup to html/latex/dokbook etc. and is capable of
handling citations via bibtex, footnotes etc. For math, you could
still use embedded latex markup.

> - Do you know some guide to organize your work

I personally use option #1. I use custom bibtex fields to link to the
summaries writting in viki markup and to the pdf documents etc. --
those fields are ignored by the usual bibtex styles. VikiMinorMode
makes those links clickable. I search the bibtex file for appropriate
keywords etc. The summaries are collected in a directory (the filename
is the bibtex key) so that they can be easily searched with grep etc.
I don't use the web-browser to edit those files. Usually I carry
around some device (laptop, netbook, handheld etc.) that contains all
those files. I use unison to sync all those text files between
different computers/devices.

Disclosure of interests: I'm the author of viki & deplate.

[setog3]

> #1
> Put all text files on a shared folder both you and your director/
> supervisor have access to and edit them with vim. In this scenario,
> viki (or a similar plugin) would be ok.
>

> I personally use option #1. I use custom bibtex fields to link to the
> summaries writting in viki markup and to the pdf documents etc. --
> those fields are ignored by the usual bibtex styles. VikiMinorMode
> makes those links clickable. I search the bibtex file for appropriate
> keywords etc. The summaries are collected in a directory (the filename
> is the bibtex key) so that they can be easily searched with grep etc.

ok, thx, I will try to use this option too. Can you provide an example
(real
example) of this kind of directory ? how you manage your Home page,
etc.. +
the bibtex entry etc.. how you generate the latex after that etc.. so
the
question is can you provide a part (or the whole) directory that you
use this
way ? Or maybee you have a blog/site with this kind of things ?

thx in advance

> Disclosure of interests: I'm the author of viki & deplate.

and thx for your work on this tools !

--
setog3

[Grahame Blackwood]

On Tuesday 03 November 2009 20:59:20 setog3 wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am starting a PhD and I need a tool to take notes and organize
> them. My
> editor is vim since a while, so why not using vim for this. To
> organize my
> notes, I was thinking of a wiki; so I try the viki script, which works
> fine,
> but I want to know what do you think about it? Should I use a real
> wiki, and
> edit each page with vim ? Should I continue to viki ? Something else
> (wikipediafs,zim editor, another text based wiki : dokuwiki, moinmoin
> wiki, hatta ?) ?

Hi setog3

Have you had a look at VimOutliner? It is very quick for note-taking and
organising your thoughts and you can output the files to Lyx or produce html
from them.

The link is www.vimoutliner.org

Cheers

G

[Tom Link]

> Can you provide an example (real example) of this kind of directory ?

I tried to explain my approach a little bit here:

http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.html
http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.pdf

HTH

[Jan-Herbert Damm]

Hello,

Tom Link wrote on 08.11.09:

>
> > Can you provide an example (real example) of this kind of directory ?
>
> I tried to explain my approach a little bit here:
>
> http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.html

when i look at the text in this link, certain highlighted words like *bibtex*
are strangly mirrored below the baseline. is it something i have to configure?
anyone else has this problem?

jan

[Tom Link]

> >http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.html
>
> when i look at the text in this link, certain highlighted words like *bibtex*
> are strangly mirrored below the baseline.

Thanks. I'll fix the css ASAP.

[J.A.J. Pater]

>
> I tried to explain my approach a little bit here:
>
> http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.html
> http://deplate.sourceforge.net/TutorialVikiBibtex.pdf
>
> HTH
>

Thanks! It's described very clearly!
I'm going to try this, since it looks pretty clean and tide to me!

Adriaan