27 Sep, 2023
I finally flipped the table over my frustration with “modern” applications and tech stacks when it comes to simple note taking, calendar and lists.
My current setup is a folder containing the following text files:
These are kept in sync via Syncthing over my WireGuard mesh on each device. I can open any of the above in any text editor or pull the info I need in multiple ways via in-app search, ripgrep, grep. There’s no uncertainty in getting the data out, no ties to a specific protocol or app and will work on any operating system.
For instance, I live in the terminal so I created the following alias agenda along with an echo statement in my ~/.zshrc to display today and tomorrow’s entries when I launch a shell:
alias agenda='grep -A 1 --colour=always $(date +"%Y-%m-%d") "$HOME/Productivity/calendar.txt"'
echo agenda
Which displays the following when launching a new shell or running agenda:
Last login: Tue Sep 26 18:14:08 on ttys000
Today's Agenda:
2023-09-26 w39 Tue @Video 14:30 Boring Meeting.
2023-09-27 w39 Wed 16 Pick-up kids.
[✓] >
Another example, using tags and the done.txt I’ve managed to automate an annoying weekly email I have to send to my manager using a small shell script and regex. I’m not familiar with Windows these days, but I’m sure you could rig the above via PowerShell or whichever nonsense they use.
I don’t think I can ever go back to CalDAV, CardDAV, ${NOTE_APP} or ${CLIENT}. I can freely move around Neovim, iA Writer, Xed or Sublime Text. No surveillance capitalism or other funny business at play and easy to keep backups.
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