Pocket book LM and Obsidian are the dynamic duo I did not know I wanted

Taking notes is one thing many people do all through the day. I do know I can not get by way of mine with out setting reminders or jotting down a couple of issues to jog my reminiscence. It is like I am nonetheless at school and note-taking is my saving grace earlier than the following take a look at — besides as an alternative of finding out, I am simply making an attempt to not overlook one thing I have to do.

Whether or not I am in a gathering or researching a brand new matter for a narrative, I take notes as I’m going. I strive to determine what is going on on with a brand new program or make sense of a subject that is getting traction currently, and I jot issues down alongside the best way. My favourite app to make use of is Obsidian. It is nice for holding tabs on every kind of matters, and a free, easy-to-use note-taking app that is turn out to be in style with hundreds of thousands of customers.

I am additionally a giant proponent of NotebookLM and figured why not attempt to use Google’s note taking app to assist me decipher a few of my notes in Obsidian. What I discovered was really fairly shocking. Not solely is my handwriting atrocious, however my notes might be actually arduous to decipher. Fortunately, AI was capable of assist me spot some patterns.

Obsidian is straightforward to make use of and easy to combine

I used to be happy with methods to convey it over

For those who’re utilizing Obsidian, you may open totally different sorts of notes and use them for absolutely anything. On the finish of the day, you are the one typing in them, so it is utterly as much as you ways you utilize them. I like to make use of Obsidian to maintain monitor of my week. I normally have a word with reminders for every day, together with one for freelance matters I need to analysis for story concepts. I will even make a each day word for random ideas or issues I have to look into.

Fortunately, there are a couple of methods to combine the notes I preserve in my Obsidian vault. I can export them as PDFs and add them to NotebookLM. It is easy sufficient, however you do have to save lots of every word individually. That may current a little bit of a problem, because you would possibly lose the connections between your notes — and the AI might not perceive how every little thing matches collectively. So, utilizing Markdown hyperlinks is necessary.

Markdown is the key ingredient for simple integration

You possibly can copy, paste, and get the hyperlinks

As a result of NotebookLM works with Markdown, I take advantage of Markdown hyperlinks in my Obsidian notes. I depend on these hyperlinks to attach my notes and assist me perceive which matters are a part of the identical analysis thread. I do preserve them in folders in my vault, however relatively than opening one word after which one other simply to toggle between them, a Markdown hyperlink lets me bounce from one to the opposite.

Which means I can copy and paste textual content from Obsidian into NotebookLM, and it understands how the notes are linked… all due to the Markdown hyperlinks. That is confirmed after I use one of many many options that NotebookLM presents to assist folks examine and do analysis. After all, I additionally fill out my pocket book with different analysis hyperlinks outdoors of Obsidian to color a fuller image of no matter matter I am diving into, particularly if I am beginning with notes I uploaded from Obsidian.

Thoughts Map helps me join my analysis additional

I uploaded a listing of the notes I had opened right this moment and threw them into NotebookLM’s Thoughts Map. It mapped out all of my notes, displaying how they’re linked and methods to greatest navigate by way of them. It even discovered elements of my analysis and notes that I hadn’t linked by way of Markdown hyperlinks and grouped them collectively. Which may seem to be a small factor, however I accomplish that a lot analysis on totally different matters that it may be powerful to maintain monitor of every little thing.

Granted, I do not all the time put every little thing into Obsidian. However I do incessantly hyperlink again to older notes from new ones. Utilizing Thoughts Map helps me make deeper connections to notes I’ll have missed linking. I additionally actually loved the newer NotebookLM software, Experiences. I will add in a few of my scribblings (which can learn like they’re from a madman) and Experiences can flip that right into a briefing doc to assist me higher perceive each my very own writing and the analysis hyperlinks I’ve added from across the internet. Since NotebookLM makes use of no matter I present as its supply materials, it will probably pull the solutions I would like straight from my analysis.

Generally, I simply use it to summarize and assist me manage

I can ask inquiries to remind me concerning the matter

I do a lot in Obsidian to maintain monitor of every little thing occurring in each my skilled and private life. Since I am at my pc for a lot of the day, I converted from the iPhone’s Notes app to Obsidian as a result of it is a lot simpler to arrange and customise with totally different options. Now that NotebookLM has a cell app as effectively, it opens up much more flexibility in how I combine it with Obsidian.

I can return into Obsidian to revise or develop what I’ve written and benefit from its big selection of options. Conserving Obsidian tidy additionally improves how effectively NotebookLM can course of and use the content material — particularly as I make updates. As soon as I sync the 2, I can use NotebookLM like a chatbot, asking questions to look deeper into the analysis. The extra I take advantage of these two and combine them, the higher they’re going to be, which is one thing I am genuinely so enthusiastic about.