Select 'Insert Note Sequence' (Ctrl+Alt+I) and input the next few Child Note numbers, separated by a comma and a space. Next move to the Note Sequence Tab and right click on the Note. In order to do this, go to the Data window, select the Titles Tab and select the Note which you want to use as the parent, so that appears in the Text window. The next step is most important as you need to focus Zkn3 on the new Parent Note. You might select a Note to be the Parent Note or you might make a new Note as a Register Note, and put into the Text box the outline of the Theme. Note Sequences - Constructing a Theme from existing Notes Keep adding Child Notes at the appropriate levels using the methods above. branch off) select the Child Note where you want the branch and use Ctrl+I
To add another Child Note AT A LOWER LEVEL (i.e. To add another Child Note AT THE SAME LEVEL select the Parent Note and use Ctrl+I (I find it useful to do this in the Note Sequence Tab of the Data window) or use the Note Sequence Button on the Toolbar. To add the first Child Note, select the Parent Note so that it appears in the Text Box and then use Ctrl+I to create the next Note in the Sequence To do this:Ĭreate the first Note of your new Theme using Ctrl+N or the button on the Toolbar. Note Sequences - Constructing a Theme as you read a sourceĪs you read your source, you come across references that you want to add into the Zettelkasten as a new Theme. Read through the material to find relevant paragraphsĬopy and paste the text into a Zettelkasten Note, adding Author, Keywords, Links and References.
If not run the document through Abbyy FineReader 15 to produce a PDF with text Digital documents: books, journals, archival material in digital formats such as PDFīefore reading confirm that the PDF has a text file behind it. To extract the digital text from the image, the easiest way is to use Abbyy Screenshot Reader and you can then paste it directly into your Zettelkasten.Īnother method with a book containing a lot of references is to mark them with paper stick on arrow markers and then use a book scanner to scan the pages and turn them into a PDF, from where you can copy/paste them into the Zettekasten. Using the 'Document' format means that the programme with automatically deskew and crop to the printed text. Take a photograph using the Microsoft Camera on my Surface Go (Windows 10) tablet, usually in a library or archive. txt document and copy and paste the text into a Zettelkasten Note txt document with the page number of the source. The small file size helps with rapid transfer. Save the resultant text document in either OneDrive or Google Drive as a. ( Using the Document option and then saving the document as a PDF, I found after about 10 goes that I received a message "You have exceeded the number of service requests") Perhaps mark up the book with arrow markers for later incorporation into the Zettelkasten.Ĭapture these using Microsoft Lens (for Android) on my phone using Action/Text capture to utilise the OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to convert the image into digital text.
Read the book to find relevant paragraphs for including in the Zettelkasten. Physical documents: books, printed journals, paper or photographic documents
The result of these considerations makes my workflow look something like this: Luhmann reckoned that working on the Zettelkasten was more work than reading the sources.Īlso the workflow for using the Zettelkasten needs to be as seamless as possible, so that Notes can be created quickly and easily with little effort. Although it is easier to create Notes Sequences as you go along, nonetheless a review process to turn individual Notes into Note Sequences can work just as well, especially with complex Themes. When reading a source or even multiple sources, it might be obvious which Notes form a common Theme, however this is not always the case, so it would pay dividends to be able to go back and construct these themes later on. Minimum number of keywords to give them proper weight and use of links to join Themes together In your Zettelkasten you should aim for the majority of Notes to be formed into Note Sequences along any number of branching and interconnected Themes.
This connection was much more powerful than simple Keywords or Manual Links.
It is clear from this essay (see slide 34 onwards) that the real driver behind Luhmann's Zettelkasten was Note Sequences ( Folgezettel) where Notes were linked as Themes which branched and divided as the Theme developed. Introduction to Luhmann's Zettelkasten thinking and its technical implementation - lecture slides The temptation is to leap straight in and start adding Notes and Keywords to your brand new Zettelkasten, however first it might be best to understand Luhmann's original ideas which you can do here: Adapting the Zkn3 Workflow to Luhmann's working practice