Should you use blocks or pages in LogSeq?
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- Опубликовано: 6 сен 2024
- You can link to anything in LogSeq, why make pages at all? I'm talking about the difference between the two, how I use them in my workflow and why the combination of both gives me the right information when I need it.
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#logseq #roam
I watched a few of your videos on Logseq and they are so much more useful than the other Logseq videos I have watched so far!
There are dozens of videos explaining the very basics of Logseq, but once you understand that it's not at all obvious what to read/watch to learn more about how to use Logseq. The workflow part of your video is a great example of a video that fills that gap!
The other videos out there use examples that are too simplistic to be relatable. You prepared your examples beforehand and it really shows. In other videos the creator shows 10 different ways how you could approach adding a certain type of knowledge to Logseq and then discusses the up and downsides while making clear they don't know what the right way is (in a very non-concise way). But I already know that Logseq is super flexible, they don't need to show me. I'd rather watch videos from 10 different people who have a system that has worked well for them for them. Then I'll make up my own mind.
I'll definitely keep an eye on your videos!
Same, I really enjoy practical examples. Totally get the vibe as I'm currently waiting for a moonlander keyboard and I just want to hear how people are using them. Same reason why my top 5 queries video tomorrow is ordered by what I do with them, not the name of the query.
My workflow follows yours closely, but I want to point a challenge (and a solution to it) that I found quite major.
Say you have a (very large) book with its own page, and you take a lot of notes in your journal. I'm taking notes for chapter 1 of the book today, and tomorrow I'm doing this again. How do I organize this? I can repeat the header "Chapter 1 Notes" or something, but then they are disconnected. So, I can refer to the earlier block in the new one. That's alright, but it really doesn't feel as natural and nice as would've been the case had I written in a notebook. Another option could be to turn the chapter into a sub page. Still, much hassle in my opinion.
But there's more. I also generally find that the Linked References view is quite limiting. One major issue for me is that you cannot change the ordering. So with a lot of notes, you get the notes per chapter in descending order, which again, feels unnatural. Sometimes, you just want to write your notes for some resource in a certain way, and then expect to find them in that exact way later.
The solution I've come up with and which works really well is to turn the workflow inside out whenever I see fit. I.e.: take your notes on the book page itself, organized as you like with the freedom similar to taking notes in a note book. If you want to retain your chronological log in the journal, link to that journal page. This way, you can have a header for the Chapter 1 notes at the top for instance, and then have blocks linking to the appropriate journal and then have the notes underneath those blocks. It's also possible then to refer to several journal days if necessary.
Hope others are helped out by this as well.
Hey @bartkl, good points and something I have been doing with my larger research notes. I'm currently working on a video where I explain how I use Logseq to research for the Nocfree keyboard I was testing and there I show exactly what you mention. Using the page for easy to read folded information and the journal for quick capture but with the intent of moving the notes. If you're up for it, feel free to email me as I would love some feedback on the flow to tweak it before I release the full video. ( bgrolleman@toolsontech.com )
logseq is a procrastinators dream
Like most PKM tools for sure, to be honest, the biggest trick seems to be to get more out of it then you put in.
Great video! Would love one on advanced queries. (including aggregates like min,max,sum etc) :)
I think aggregates and custom formatting will be a dedicated video. But it's on my radar
Looking forward to those other Logseq videos you mentioned! My own flow makes heavy use of the "Block to page" plugin, since a) I'll just keep typing until one page has turned into a multi-block novella in desperate need of refactoring; and b) the plugin behaves better than Logseq's built-in cut & paste flow. Even takes care of linking to the new block.
Hard at work getting the advanced queries going, so that one will probably be next. And I'll have a look at the plugin because I was still using the cut&paste flow as "good enough". Thanks for the tip!
advanced queries for sure
Recorded and editing now
i swing between logseq and obsidian being i am accustomed more on obsidian graphs (personal choice). so pages are better for me
For sure, if you use both tools then blocks are breaking.
Me too, looking forward to those videos you mentioned!
Same, I did this in between so I could spend a little more time researching for the other two. I had to actually go through an O'Reilly book on Clojure to fully grasp the idea of the query language.
You could do a video on Logseq links vs tags too
Good one, adding it to the idea list. I got a separate page with tags I use so plenty to think about there.
This is a great idea. In one of Aryan's video's (linked below) Aryan shows how he uses block references for scientific equations instead of tags, to ensure that many use cases don't pollute his graph.
While I think he has a point, I feel like how specific and consistent one needs to be would cause problems in the (very) long term as you'd need to rely on your memory to keep writing in a specific way. Or you'd need to have a page with all the types of notations you use and check it every time, which is pretty cumbersome.
This is the video ruclips.net/video/Fz1EKzZZffA/видео.html
I wonder what your view on a good solution is.
Adding it to my to watch list, looks interesting.
Thank you, Bas -- great explanation. One hangup I have, however, is that if everything is written in the daily journal, it shows up as a reference on the page. What other information would get added to an actual page (besides properties), that isn't redundant, as it would already be on the page in the linked references section?
Excellent point, I usually use the page to summarize / organize the content. That's a bit of duplication but as i only do it for pages i frequently access it's well worth the effort.
This is the first time I have been able to make sense of what the differences are in terms of a "usefullness" context , rather than getting bogged down in the theory. Thanks for the great video and sharing your thoughts. I am super new to logseq ( and im trying to pair it with obsidian) but watching your videos makes me feel like there is hope to one day know what i am doing. Thanks for the motivation
Being told that it helped you make sense of it all is great motivation for me. And do let me know if you're ever stuck on something, sometimes the hardest thing to see is what's obvious to me isn't obvious to others.
hi! thanks for the video - I really wonder how to manage my contacts now, shall I drop my contact app in my mac? by the way, what's the lovely theme you're using in Logseq?
Wouldn't drop the contacts app due to syncing with all other things like mail and phone book.
In my setup I have adres details in Google contacts and keep al my notes on that person on a page of the same name.
To speed up I put a url to their Google contact page at the top but not sure if that will work for the contact app.
Theme is basic theme with purple accent and a few minor css tweaks like making bold orange for extra readability
Thanks for the useful video!
Sure thing, I might make an updated version at one point as I'm learning to do more and more things with blocks. But the core principle stays the same luckily.
Are you still using Logseq with Obsidian? Would you recommend a new person use both or just Logseq if they are just starting a graph?
I mostly use LogSeq, while I can use Obsidian on the same vault I lose my advanced features like Tasks and Linking. So I only use Obsidian if I want to do things like advanced graph views for thinking or if I'm writing large sets of text with multiple information sources open.
For a new user I would recommend playing with both tools for a short bit (couple of hours), see what suits them most of the two and use that exclusively first.
@@toolsontech Thanks for the reply. I actually didn't know about Obsidian until I watched a few of your video while playing with Logseq for about a week (already have over 200 pages).
I am coming from 12 years of using Wikidpad. I would stay with Wikidpad but it hasn't been updated since 2018 so I'm getting worried that it will be gone. So I've been searching for a possible replacement that allows me to have everything in text files and gives me lots of control.
Wikidpad is very similar to what I understand of Obsidian. In wikidpad all files are text and there is wikidword text file folder and an asset folder (similar to both Obsidian and Logseq). It's page based and uses Wikiwords. There is also a primitive form of backlinking.
I used that to create a journal like system (monthly instead of daily - one page per month) and used anchors within the months the way blocks are used in Logseq.
So the use of a journal as a jump off fits in perfectly with my way of working. I like to put everything on the journal page and then link out from there.
The only problem I see with Logseq is that it doesn't allow me to do things in a freeform way that I did with Wikidpad. Whereas the blocks are nice and useful. I do like to create long form documents.
Right now I've started writing longer documents in Google Docs or in Wikidpad and just linking to them inside of Logseq, but wouldn't mind having something that is combined.
Do you think Logseq has the capability to do that (or will in the future)?
Thanks so much for the videos you put out. Makes figuring out these new tools soooooo much easier.
Writing long form in LogSeq isn't ideal and I don't feel super comfortable using the document mode for it. (t d shortcut), mostly because I can't save a mode per document. If I'm writing long form I usually pick an external editor and fix the block markers after it. I think Logseq will eventually get a beter document mode, it's requested often.
But if the long form only links to other pages, it's a perfect example on where to use Logseq and Obsidian together. Logseq for the journalling and Obsidian for long form writing. Just keep in mind that you can use block links cross platform. Sadly.
Thanks heaps !
(my own mind note: 2:42)
Nice shirt.
great video
Thanks!
Hi, how are you searching properties with that pop up? Thanks for the video.
While I usually use simple queries to filter properties, the global search is pretty flexible and properties are just text so I can search for "type:: book" and it will return pages with that type.
Hope that was what you mean, I'm also using (( that searches all blocks instead of [[ that only searches pages.
Hi, linking your videos,
How do you get those neat lines between the bullet points of the blocks? I'd like to have those...
It's a plugin called bullet threading that is lifted from Dev Theme, if you just want the threading part instructions can be found here github.com/pengx17/logseq-dev-theme#only-use-bullet-threading-styles
Hi Bas, on a somewhat related issue regarding using linked references it seems that, unless I am totally missing something, when I export a specific page or pages, any linked references on those pages do not show up. I have tried this over and over and have not found any way to achieve this.
Actually, I did stumble on something of a workaround and that is to embed a Page in another page or Daily journal page and add notes relating to the embedded page under that. When I export that embedded page it will show all notes added although they are not then linked references, just not with the date of any block entries added to it. This creates another concern for me as well.
If the above is correct then that is basically a deal breaker for me on two counts. For me any notetaking app that provides for linked references should also have the ability to combine all linked references and not just display them on the screen as Logseq does do, but also be able to print them as they appear on screen, just as if it was a single page with all the content shown as blocks on that page rather than linked references.
I hope I have explained this clearly. I really like Logseq but if my understanding is correct then it has lost a significant part of its appeal and usefulness for me.
Hope you or other readers can help.
I just did a quick test, when I export a page with both linked and embeded blocks the export has the full text version of them in it.
Did you expect markdown type links to the source pages? If that's the case then I don't have a solution and it might just not be a fit.
@@toolsontech Thanks Bas. No, I just wanted the full text but I only get the text from the original blocks on the page. I don't get any of the linked references text even though they show clearly on the screen.
I must be doing the export wrong. I'll keep trying.
What you say at 00:01:45 is wrong. You don’t have to go back to the previous page because when you write something down about a topic you do this on one page not on multiple. And even if you could use tabs.
Imagine you have a cook book and you spread receipts on multiple pages
Thanks for the timestamp, that makes it soooo much easier to remember the context I had when I made the video. :)
True, if I'm researching a single topic then you stay in a single page. To be totally honest, that method of working grew on me after I made this video.
That said, if I'm doing my day to day things and I quickly want to add something to a topic then using a block based approach in the journal is much quicker, and I believe that was the mindset I used when explaining this part.
Thanks for the reminder that I might need to redo this video for 2024, though I'll wait with that till they drop the DB version that mixes things up yet again.