Hello!
I have some big questions about Obsidian (‘O’), related programs, and knowledge creation and management. I think it is good to ask for your help by way of examples of my troubles with O, and then move to a big ask about thrle future.
I have lost data repeatedly while trying to sync between an android-powered phone and windows laptop. Onedrive / onesync, and google drive / drive sync… I repeatedly tried Dropbox too. (I would pay for O sync but am homeless, without income; one of my intended uses of O was to write materials that generate income.) So I beg thee, and how!?
Even undo / redo have eluded me on android. Most of my problems seem to be with the android app, which I would ideally use often. It’s lack of functions and the difficulty finding simple things like undo have become too much for me.
Problem I.
[Imagine that underlined. I do not know how to underline; when using Android, i have no clue about bold.]
I presently have dozens of folders and many dozen files. Almost all have duplicated± themselves repeatedly. Dunno why. Ditto some ‘conflicts’ files, though they are lessernin # / sporadic (and i do not know how to learn what the conflicts are, nor how to address them). There are still some folders / files that I have created on one device that have never synced onto the other; then, on the other device, seeing that it does not have what I was working on, I have created a second version under anothernnamen(or worsez the same, and some conflictnor number of faux-duplicates have emerged…), and start over, creating misaligned approaches that I would like to re-form into a singular, … etc.
Lots of troubles these last few months.
I previously merged all the files (taking hours). The next day (may have been a few days), they all came back. They, meaning the duplicates with ‘1’ or ‘2’ after them. I learned that ‘merge’ sounds promising but amounts to taking the text of one file and inserting it below the text of the file the user keeps. (So, not very helpful.)
Now I have dozens of lost folders and many dozens of lost files.
Files duplicated and disappeared.
ALSO, I took about three weeks trying to use onenote instead of O (as i briefly describe below). I very much wish to integrate this third (onenote wjndows) and fourth (onenote android) into the as-unified-as-possible product of what has been made with O.
Does that make sense?
I am lost, and I appreciate you considering these issues. ANY help would be so vwry appreciated!
Woud someone more knowledgeable than me advise on how to create single copies of each of the files / folders in the condition of highest functionality?
The choices and format may also involve …
Issue II
I like the basic idea of a simple program that offers numerous ways of organizing material based on a folder / file system. Or even more abstract methods - it’s great. But … I am ready to leave Obsidian. I fear that i must.
Onenote has proven problematic, too. [If it matters, most of the problems with it probably relate to a windows problem (unique to my laptop as far as i know) where I cannot sign into office, yet it hassles me to in an assaulting fashion. Ha. Really, it’s tough. I tried reinstalling. I have never been able to load MS stores etc., and I guess it is inter-related; there is a wall betweenMS and me and as a result I cannot sync onenote, among other things.]
What programs would you recommend as second to obsidian? easier for non-CS people to use and similarly potent in potential? Etc.
What do you like about Pegram(s) X, Y, &or Z?
I would love to employ concepts that many obsidian plug-ins offer to the ideal user. (But, retroactively predictably, i have also had disastrous efforts with O’s plug-ins.) For example, it would be beyond awesome to scan all my content, and use AI to create links between files, or consolidate disparate writings on Subject Q in one place, etc, etc, etc. I would be ever-so grateful for access to any ‘second mind’-type functions … oh, to discuss with AI how to improve arguments; to prompt it to conduct literature searches and display results in helpful ways, etc, would be dreams come true each day! I would love to explore so many of the neat ideas people are coming up with, as evidenced with many O plugins, but I must …
I must sadly conclude my four-month experiment learning to use O a failure.
I am a researcher / writer and that is the primary use for O & co. I would much prefer not to go back to disorganized, 100s-of-pages docxs and pdfs, xls, etc., especially when I know that more is possible. Thousands of papers everywhere - eek!
But I do not know programming. Though many good people profess that a solid background in CS isnt necessary to do well wtih O-type programs, my experience is that it is essential. It is vital. And i won’t anytime soon. (I do not know how to use github, etc.) When well-intending people write careful descriptions of how to program an app to do , I find a way to make it not qork. Dunno how. And I have high- priority things gathering dust.
What programs would be good to start with now, solid and capable craft to use most, and would be able to help me move into tech solutions and tools in the decades ahead?
Ideally, I can sync multiple devices, even if I have to use them differently. For example, if I am backpacking (or secluded from laptop somewhere with a new lover) and type words into my phone at night, it would be great to be able to access my existing knowledge, and integrate new stuff into it, you know? (Just simple syncing, but into a well-organized library of my own design thanks to Program [Y].)
Privacy is a civil right I very much want to maximize for all of us, and so i try to practice privacy good manners to the utmost. (It’s good for each of us as individuals, and necessary for society that all of us to push back against evil multinationals with undressing concentrations of power, limited perhaps someday soon only perhaps by what we do now, today, to constrain the rich-and-obsessed-with-oppression class.)
Open-source is preferred. (I will donate when I can.)
I have 10k pieces coming up for publication, and see books in time. Each project exists within my intellectual universe(s?) In its own way, though they share similar fundamental assumptions abiut physical and supernatural systems. Sorry it is a bad analogy. But you know?
Thank you for any help you can offer getting my data into good order, identifying a new playground, and migrating there. i would really value whatever you have to say!
Gratefully,
…
FYI, by looking far and wide through the forums, it is pleasing to find that this program works for many. But it seems no matter what plug-ins I try, or solutions I adopt, it fights me.
I am not adverse to following multi- level instructing when setting something up; a big O issue is that nearly everything in it requires significant time and thought in on almost a minute- to- minute basis.
I do not want to have to think about the program. I must focus without distraction in other stuff, and O, after months of trying, still requires I focus on it. And it had never been worth it to me.
P.s. - I will check thus again and again, and read and play with ending that is said, but it may not be eith the immediacy that seems common in the internet. It may take a couple of days sometimes. Just please do not think me ungrateful; that is the opposite of my reaction to an individual who shares!
the o ly way i know how to now is to write short stories, or just scribbles of scenes, and i do … but these stories would be animated with the vivscity of my soul were i able to harness my collective works ably, and populate the story with my most apt expressions used to lesser effect elsewhere]
I have done the prep work, as Malcolm fowl pages, and am in need of some luck.