I developed a coherent Zettelkasten content pipeline

The following diagram explains the flow of my #Zettelkasten content pipeline.

  • Incoming information: reading
    • My primary reading sources are Apple Books, Safari, and DEVONthink.
    • I’m taking notes while reading.
      • I use the built-in annotation tools in Apple Books.
      • I use Quick Notes in Safari.
      • I use the built-in annotation tools in DEVONthink or PDF Viewer for marking up PDFs.
  • Incoming information: fleeting notes and ideas.
    • Fleeting notes and ideas are things that I came up with from my mind.
    • Usually, these are triggered via external events like reading.
  • Processing
    • All of these annotations, ideas, and notes are collected in my Things inbox, where I process them using progressive summarization / sense-making.
    • I highlight the interesting parts and then add these to separate Bike outlines with a link to the source.
    • I’m organizing these ideas in Bike, and then I export them into Zettelkasten notes through Drafts.
    • They will end up in my Zettelkasten as new notes ready for drafting.
  • Drafting
    • I use the #Drafting hashtag to keep track of my notes in iA Writer using a smart folder.
    • While editing my notes, I expand new ideas into separate notes created on the fly and linked.
      • I usually add the #Drafting hashtag to these too.
    • When a note is finished, I mark it with the #Linking hashtag
  • Linking
    • I also have a Linking smart folder in iA Writer for notes that must be added to my main outline.
      • I do linking on my Mac because I need a bigger screen.
      • I keep my outline source in Bike and add new notes there.
    • I find the note most appropriate place in my outline and add its ID and title there.
      • I have a shortcut that finds the corresponding note for the selected Bike row, assigns an ID according to its place in the outline, and links it from the Bike outline.
    • The next step is finding and linking related notes, which can be done in Bike or my outline directly on my Zettelkasten site.
      • This is the hard part, where I have to find a connection between the new notes and existing ones.
    • When satisfied, I export the Bike outline into a raw Markdown file for Jekyll and sync it up with my Zettelkasten site.
  • Searching
    • I mostly use The Archive to search and browse my Zettelkasten.
    • I also have private notes there, which are hidden from my published Zettelkasten so that I can keep track of other information in my Zettelkasten, too.

Screenshots of iA Writer smart folders setup