How to organize your notes in Obsidian // The LATCH method
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- Опубліковано 12 чер 2024
- Wondering how to organize your notes in Obsidian? In this video, I talk about some methods in Obsidian for imposing structure and organization, the LATCH method for adding data to your data, and which methods I would use in Obsidian for each part of LATCH (Location, Alphabet, Time, Category, and Hierarchy). This is not meant to be a definitive or prescriptive guide for how YOU should organize your notes. Instead, take this as a look into how I prefer to do it, in the hopes that you may find inspiration for how you'd like to do it as well.
// RESOURCES MENTIONED
Richard Saul Wurman, Information Anxiety: amzn.to/3DG9iew
Zsolt Viczián's introduction of the LATCH method: • Visualize your locatio...
// TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intro
0:30 Methods in Obsidian for organizing your notes
04:08 The LATCH system
05:03 Locations: links, metadata
07:08 Alphabet: folders
09:09 Time: links, metadata
11:19 Category: links, metadata, tags
13:14 Hierarchy: metadata, links
If you want to learn more about Obsidian, check out my course for beginners, Obsidian for Everyone: courses.nicolevanderhoeven.co...
---
// ABOUT ME
Site: nicolevanderhoeven.com
Mastodon: pkm.social/@nicole
My work at Grafana Labs: • My work at Grafana Labs
// APPS I USE
- Obsidian: obsidian.md
- Readwise: readwise.io/nicole
- Shortform: shortform.com/nicole
- Reclaim: go.reclaim.ai/eg0tgbamp7cb
- Snipd: link.snipd.com/Cx7S/nicole
Napkin: napkin.one/?via=nicole
// GEAR
nicolevanderhoeven.com/gear/
// WANT TO SUPPORT ME?
❤️ Join my Patreon and get my sample vault with templates: / nicolevdh
☕ Buy me a coffee: ko-fi.com/nicolevdh
⭐ Buy Obsidian for Everyone, my beginner course on Obsidian: courses.nicolevanderhoeven.co...
Note: Some of the links above are affiliate links, which means I may get a small percentage when you sign up using those links. To see how I decide what to promote in this way, check out my Ethics Statement: nicolevanderhoeven.com/ethics/ - Наука та технологія
I was using the theme Minimal in this video, and mentioned/used these plugins: Search (core), Quick Switcher (core), Calendar, Fantasy Calendar, Daily Notes (core), Dataview, ExcaliBrain, Leaflet.
Thanks
Spanish people :) Great summary to find the plugins that you used here. Btw do you speak Spanish? :O
Glad you like the summary! It's one of the most common things people ask me about, so I thought I'd make it a bit easier. :)
Yes, I do speak Spanish. Feel free to address me in Spanish as well!
Gracias por la información me han servido mucho tus tutoriales.
Nicole, thank you for taking the time to make your videos. You have an easy manner and explain things clearly without talking down to your viewers. I appreciate that. I also like that you show lots of examples. Rather that just talking about the "philosophy" of using Obsidian while showing pretty pictures which change every four or five seconds and generally have little to nothing to do with what is being discussed you present information that I find useful AND actionable. Again, thank you very much!
Hey Michael! Thank you for the support! Yeah, I'm a little allergic to philosophies and methodologies and prefer to show my use cases instead. It would be weird to try to get everyone to do things the same way! I feel very strongly about that. Happy that it resonates with you.
Thank you. I've watched at least six videos trying to figure out what a MOC is. The others just talked over my head, but, while explaining LATCH, you casually defined it. My search is over. Now I can start using it. That earned you a "like" and a "subscribe." Now to check out your other videos. Thanks for keeping it simple.
Hey Glenn, I love this comment. I'm so happy that I was able to explain MoCs for you. I'm sorry it took so long for you to find what you were looking for! It's weird how much terminology there is in note taking these days. Thanks for the support! <3
Another nice Saturday morning with Nicole. Thank you.
Certainly! Nicole made me smiling even though I didn't get enough sleep :)
Nicole. Sometimes I can't follow everything you say, but your perfect English diction makes it very easy when I go through the translator. Thank you so much. You have a lot of energy in your voice.
Just began using Obsidian and your videos on the app have been so so helpful!!!! Thank you for making these.
Hi Nicole! I loved this video, and it did speak to me, as I'm a new Obsidian user, and I've been suffering from "Analysis Paralysis" because of the organization part.
Thanks a lot! / Muito obrigado! 😁
OMG thanks Nicole. I finally get the magnitude of Obsidian! Watching your channel like a Netflix series ☺️
I always love your videos. Each time I watch one of your videos my obsidian value some how gets better in a more concise way or productive way. I appreciate your contribution and dedication to obsidian. I have been a subscriber for maybe 6 months and have learned so much in not just zettlecasting but also managing obsidian when it can be so easily overwhelming. I have been trying to figure out how to journal, manage my life, zettlecasting as well as doing school work. Currently I have been think about journaling on paper just miss the analog, using woodnotes for math notes, Todoist for to do list task (I use the plug in for obsidian on my daily note) and using template and working on using projects for a school dashboard for easy note creation for lecture notes (sort of using as literature notes) and using a plug in for flashcards for spaced repetition as studying. I hope you can do some videos on using fantasy calendar if you haven't already.
Again thank you for the great content.
This is just fantastic Nicole. You’re doing an awesome job with your channel!
I've been puzzled by how people create their personal folder structures, so I often "interview" friends and co-workers that I consider information savvy. Being an IM professional, I also take great interest in how my clients have organized their shared folder structures. Because of this, I was excited when you started to show yours. Despite your explanation, you did not disappoint, since you are well aligned with everyone else I spoke with.
My general findings are people start off with a few folders that were created with some degree of rational thought, then add folders in an ad-hoc manner, wherever it made sense to who created the folder, when they created it. After a while, many different mindsets came into play regarding where folders were created, what they were called, and what they contained. The folder structure rationale has long since faded, and familiarity was the driving force to people's proficiency for what is stored where, and what it is called. And, of course, forgetfulness eventually creeps in regarding more obscure folders & locations, and there goes the proficiency.
I'd love to chat sometime to get more of your thoughts on the subject.
Thank you SO MUCH for your videos!! I have been using Notion for literature notes for my research and I migrating to Obsidian and build a Zettlekasten system. Your videos are EXCELLENT to actually understand the structure behind Obsidian so I can build my system as I want and decide which plugins may be helpful.
You have definitely found your calling. I could listen to you forever. And I love the bright hair. I do that for a living.
Since my english is poor, I rarely see a tutorial in english. But your english is incredibly clear. I could understand each word. Thank you for your video!
Glad to hear it! English is not my first language, so that's probably why it's a bit more accessible. I'm happy for it! <3
Hi Nicole! I discovered Obsidian three days ago and I started watching your videos on that same night. Day three of watching your videos on the subject of organization and navigation and I'm a little bit obsessed with your work, it's so well done! Thank you so much for sharing these, subscribed in a heartbeat
Thank you so much, Gvido! I so appreciate the encouragement. It really means a lot to me. <3
Hi Nicole! Thanks a lot for all the work you're putting in this channel. It's helping me out a lot with building my 2nd brain with Obsidian! Question: do you stick to one language throughout your notes or do you switch between Dutch/English/other ? I'm a programmer from Belgium still figuring out my preferred way of notetaking. Groeten!
Yes! Perfect day for a new one of your Obsidian videos 😊
Awwww, glad you think so! :)
It’s almost like you can see my vault. Perfect timing for this video. Thank you.
Love it! Happy to oblige. :)
this is the topic i have been waiting ^^ thank you mam
As always: very helpful. Thanks!
Thanks Nicole. Great run-through. I also keep #tags for status and grand separation and frontmatter for categorisation. 🌹
High five! :)
Thanks for your videos!
I love your channel, you seem so kind!
Hi! I'm not always. :) But I always try to be! Thanks for watching. Happy you liked my channel!
Hallo Nicole, Du machst das prima. Vielen Dank und viele Grüße aus Deutschland!
I hope this helps me organize all the Notion notes I'm about to migrate.
Richard Saul Wurman would be so proud
Hi Nicole, You have built a great day planner template. I am not that much of a tech person. It would be great if you can make a video on that template! Excellent video bdw! loved it.
I love Roam, but your content is so awesome that I've started using Obsidian again just to see if there are some workflows I can integrat back into Roam.
Everyone is welcome here regardless of the tool they use! :) Happy you're still finding my stuff useful!
You're awesome Nicole! Great work. Thanks! :)
Awww, thanks, Katarzyna! Glad you liked it.
I'm looking for a video about cleaning up piles of less processed notes. This is a good start.
Thank you. After start using Obsidian I can't figure out how to better organise notes. I develop and try different strategies. But now I understand that I need to use them all at once and LATCH method answers why so.
Happy to help, Alexei! I personally don't always use everything in LATCH for every single note, but I still find it a very useful way to create metadata. :)
I use Obsidian for learning, and since my focus areas are in educational research and mathematics, almost everything can be sorted by concrete nouns. For example, "Constructivism" is a singular noun with a definition, so I'll make a note called "Constructivism" and discuss it there. Then, as if there Wikipedia pages, any other note where I'll talk about constructivism will be linked to it in the natural context of the sentence.
Basically the result of this is that all my notes are just nouns describing exactly what they're about, so Quick Switcher makes it easy to find anything instantly, and my graph view gives me a good insight about cross-subject relationships
Olá Nicole, just getting started with Obsidian (from using Joplin for almost 2 years) and your videos have helped me a lot so thanks for that! You clearly have a knack for explaining things very well and thoroughly :) Quick question on your AWS example, you mention you "haven't yet put those AWS subcategory notes into your main AWS note", just wondering what you mean by this? Your AWS note I'm guessing is a MOC note so do you mean you would potentially create an AWS folder and put the MOC note and all the AWS xxx notes in there with it? btw massive coincidence but i also work in performance testing and am portuguese lol
great vids, super helpful
Great instructtion!
Hi Nicole! Love your content! Just wanted ask why you have so many dates as part of your metadata. Is this for monitoring when the note is changed? Thank you! 😁
That's a great video, thanks for sharing. Just a quick question, will you be doing any videos about dashboards using Dataview plugin. In my opinion, Dataview needs an entire series of videos.
Sei meravigliosa, unica, grande insegnante, la "Reina" di OBSIDIAN 😀
You do year month day for your chronological dating! You are now one of my favorite people 😊
Thank you for a great video! - A question about the AWS note (at 08:26): what did you use for creating the mindmap visible on this note?
Hi Nicole! I like your videos and learned a lot! Thank you for your sharing!! It seems that in your notes, you have put date infos, and add a new date metadate each time you edited the note. Isn't it? If I didn't understand it wrong, could you tell me how do you program to add a new date each time you edit it ?
What helped me a lot was 2nd brain by Tiago Forte. There is much more to it, but for the basic structure I have 4 folders: 1 projects, 2 areas, 3 resources, 4 archive; and then also my journal folder.
... I'm glad I watched this before I got to deep into Obsidian
Thank you, very useful. You seem to use the words folders, files and sometimes notes loosely ie interchange them ? Can cause confusion.
Hey !
1. Love your content :)
2. I notice on 11:36 you insert dates on metadata & inside the page as tags.
right now I have a dataview query in each dailynote to show me on which notes I worked on the same date, however sometimes I'd like to link between the notes to those dates. How do you manage this ? when you insert the date in the metadata and when in the page?
Thanks
You really sholuld add the Omnisearch plugin. It is brilliant!
My biggest difficulty is that Folder isn't optional, you HAVE to put it somewhere, so I often get frozen trying to figure out where I want to put it. If I don't put it somewhere then I'll just end up with an unending scrolling list of notes would would drive me nuts.
How do you automatically enter a data for a new note created? And can you create a template to use when creating a new note with CTRL N
Thanks!
Thank you so much, Jeff! Appreciate you and your support! :)
Thanks Nicole, by the way, what does tvz stand for??
Have you covered how to combine / embed / whatever-it's-called to include another file (or section of one) in a new one? So actually including the content of the other source, versus just linking to its location. Thanks!!!
Hi! I have shown how to do it in my "Obsidian for non-coders" one, and I called it embedding blocks/notes/sections. :)
Oi, Nicole. Eu gosto de usar mapas mentais para organizar grandes temas em categorias mais abrangentes. Descobri que o Obsidian suporta parte da sintaxe Mermaid de forma nativa. Fiz alguns fluxogramas simples, porém tenho maior interesse no Mermaid para construção de mapas mentais (essa parte o Obsidian não suporta). Não encontrei ninguém comentando sobre uso de Mermaid no Obsidian, mas fiquei empolgada. Você tem notícias se o Obsidian tem interesse em desenvolver mais essa sintaxe (ou outra) que possibilite a criação dos mapas mentais nativos no aplicativo? Obrigada.
Veja o Obsidian Canvas, @liam.1824
Огромное спасибо! Именно это видео я в последнее время искал на канале, потому что столкнулся с необходимостью реорганизации структуры и иерархии моих заметок. Вы как почувствовали :)) Очень вовремя, с радостью сейчас буду смотреть! 👍❤🙏😊
Спасибо большое за видео, Николь! Как всегда очень полезно и познавательно!
One last thing (promise x) - if I want to write a chapter in a book on "how to give FEEDBACK", if I create a page called FEEDBACK, then because FEEDBACK is a general word used in all sorts of context, wont the unlinked mentions be supernumerous. So, how then do I pull all the items I have collated over the years on FEEDBACK without getting erroneous results from the general areas? What would you do?
i looked at the description and didn’t see… what do you use that shows your key-presses as you type?
Hi, thank you very much for your videos, I just discovered them a few hours ago and I am watching many of them to help me harness the great Obsidian!
I have a question : at 10:11 you open your "today's note" and with the backlinks panel you're able to see all the notes you have created on that day, but for that you need to have put the date as metadata in each note.
I have tried setting the date of a note in YAML Front Matter format like this:
---
date: 2023-01-04
---
but it wasn't recognised as a backlink, while writing it the way you did in the video:
%%
date: 2023-01-04
%%
it was recognised as a backlink.
Why is that so, and what are the differences between those two ways of writing metadata?
Thank you very much for your video and any answer you (or anyone) would provide 🙏
The metadata between --- is yaml. It’s the kind of markup that Obsidian supports but it’s not a part of markdown language, it has its own set of rules and you can’t do things within that block in the same way you do them in the rest of your note. [[Links]] are one of those things that don’t work, unfortunately. So the date Nicole uses there is just text without brackets, it is not a link.
%% are Obsidian’s comment format. Everything between those symbols won’t be visible in the reading mode or exported version of your notes but other than that, you can do pretty much anything there that you can do in the rest of your note. The dates Nicole is using there are [[Links]] and that’s why they show up in the backlinks of the daily note for that date.
@@ent2263 Thank you very much for your answer, it's appreciated 🙏
What system or techniques do you use to maintain your speaking cadence ?
Is your game online? I'm a DM for a campaign, but your games seem like they'd be fun to play in!
Thank you for the video! Could you please elaborate on the inline metadata with %% symbols? Where I can read more about it?
Hey! They're comments: pulse.ly/z1dbinv6r9
Thank you. You have given me some good ideas for (re)organizing my notes.
Why are the inline dates between '%% ... %%'? Is this for a plug-in?
You have multiple inline dates between '%% ... %%' and multiple dates in the YAML, but they are different. Why are they different? Different meaning? Why have both? Is this for different plugins?
Hi Johan! The %%s denote comments. They are native to Obsidian and they have a few advantages. They don't appear when rendered (in reading mode or when you publish notes), and any links there are clickable. When you put links in the YAML frontmatter, they are not clickable.
The only reason I have both is because I haven't fully moved those frontmatter dates to dates within the comments. :) I usually use comments for dates, and YAML frontmatter for information that doesn't contain links.
@@nicolevdh That is very nifty, putting links in comments so they don't show up in reading mode but Obsidian can work with them AND how you divide relations and metadata over frontmatter and inline comments. Thanks.
Also, do you still use folders. I was looking at an obsidian similar platform called LOGSEQ - and you cannot create folders with that platform because it wants you to create everything in the DAILY NOTE and then link or tag the individual blocks within that daily note (some of which might not be actionable). Have you heard of this new system, suggesting a move away from the old FOLDERS and SUBFOLDERS system? I'm interested and intrigued but too scared to make the move. Would value your thoughts as you make such good tutorials.
Curious how to handle readwise content
Thanks for the video.
What's the difference between #tags and tags in metadata?
Nothing, really! They are both tags. Metadata can be more than just tags, though!
Hi. Could you please explain in which cases would you use frontmatter vs inline metadata fields? The main difference I found so far is that inline allows you to add note links, which makes me wonder what's the benefit of using frontmatter over a commented inline block
Hey! That is the main difference indeed. As for why you would use frontmatter instead, it's more of an accepted format-- YAML frontmatter is commonly used in the tech industry, so it's more "futureproof" from that perspective. Also, some people just like the look of it.
Personally, I find myself using comments more and more, just because I like that I can click on links there and that those links will update if I change the filename of the note being linked to.
Thanks!
8:25 What is that graph called and how does one create it?
An imperfect analogy, but LATCH is sort of like using GPS for your notes so you can find them. GPS doesn't work with only one or two satellites, it requires the signals of several, and if I'm not mistaken, about as many as LATCH has letters ;)
I have a question. How do you manage tag hierarchy and its synonyms? It's always so hard to keep perfect ontological tag system.
I always end up with many tags that have hierarchical / subset relationship with each other and everything starts to mess up.
Do you have any method to periodically merge/divide existing tags and keep the tags useful and systematically meaningful?
Hey! Yeah, it's not perfect, but you can use the Tag Wrangler plugin to make it easier to merge/divide tags. :)
@nicolevdh Seems like it's literally a tag wrangler that bulk changes tag names and that's pretty much it. I was thinking more about auto tagging feature and tag clustering recommendation based on tag/content similarity.
Didn't you stumble upon the same problem as I did? I think every tag based knowledge management system is doomed to face complexity issue unless you handle tags like folders or intentionally suppress its potential. What do you do with your system?
Oh, I thought that WAS what you wanted. I don't know of anything that suggests tags.
I didn't come across it because I don't use tags that much. I have a handful of them that are more for system tags, but I don't use them to impose structure or relations or categories. I use maps of content and metadata + ExcaliBrain for those.
What does TVZ stand for?
Hi , I was insprised by your method at 10:23 and start adding the same fomart to my note
%%
date:: [[2023-04-30]]
%%
but recently my notes original file.cday all get wrong by my mistake, and some of the notes didn't contain the metadata of creation_date in the frommatter. Only the "date" in the inline field.
The problem is I cannot use dataview to query them since they contains "[[" and "]]" . Is there a way to query them with dataview?
Yep, put them in double quotes:
date:: "[[2023-04-30]]"
I am not a programmer and didn't understand anything related to meta data and stuff. Well, will stick to links and hashtags for now.
could you tell me what TVZ stands for in your tag?
Sure! it's "To Verzetteln", which is my own way of saying "inbox". You can call it whatever makes sense to you, though!
can I color the words
Hello Nicole, are you muli- or bi-lingual?
I noticed you were referencing or speaking different languages in your videos. That brings me the problem I am having with organizing my notes:
I can read multiple languages and I process information from different languages into notes. Most notes I take are in English and German, but also a few in French and Dutch. The problem really is organizing and linking together these notes, because they are in different languages. Any ideas on effectively organizing notes that are in different languages?
Right now, I am just dumping most of my notes in an "incoming" folder, but that's not working out very well, as you might imagine.
@janosch1097 in the video there is an example where she uses aliases (at the YAML part), and it works natively in Obsidian. You could use aliases to make this note appear even if you link to it using a word from another language (if first you put that word in the aliases section of the YAML). Take a look at Obsidian's help > Aliases. (In the future, aliases will work also in the body of the notes, not only in the YAML frontmatter). Cheers
@@claudio888 I will take a look! Let's see if it makes the mess more manageable. Thank you!
Order of the Killer Eggshell Invaders? Sounds completely harmless and trivial, but unbeknownst to me, they might be absolutely behemotic word-eaters.
Hahaha! It's the name of my Pathfinder 2e party, and we get a bit silly. ;)
8:37
Omnisearch plugin is good to find things in Obsidian...
If you use Russian, then you mean "Благодарю" - "Give you good (things)". I personaly prefer to say it instead of "Спасибо". With ending "я" that word mean "with help of (something)" and do not used as general thank you word.
Thank you, Alexei! I have been saying the wrong thing all this time! Appreciate that. Благодарю!
Really nice conversation here! :)
Благодарю вас, друзья! 😉❤🤗🙏😊
аз Благодаря
4:15 it felt for a moment he was coming onto this video... but then notices all of it got explained by you instead. 😕... 🙂
5:30... ah, the game is Pathfinder, and it had some menace and troubles under the Fishery of Tamily Tanderveil. Hope you dealt with those nasty rats ... ;-)
8:45 Nowadays the Quick Switcher is by default enabled.
1.75x speed
This app reminds me of Wikipedia
Looks like this video is for people who can understand coding.
WTF is a metadata?
Thanks!