What kind of information will you save in Personal Knowledge Base?

Do you use or want to any personal knowledge base tools? if yes, what kind of information you will save to the PKB?

15 points | by hanhongli 1628 days ago

4 comments

  • PenguinCoder 1627 days ago
    I use Confluence for various topics in my PKB. I have sections (spaces) for Recipes I've found or made, Technical internals (network map and connectivity, what did I do to make that Raspberry pi project?, How do I add a new VLAN to this damn router, What's the process for restoring my paperless document server, one off scripts / oneliners I find useful, etc), meat space stuff (hardware/powertools/appliance serial numbers, part numbers, maint schedule, where to buy parts), and my own tracking of college course syllabus (or cert exams) for studying and tracking. Adding my own notes and processes with sources that I obtained the information has been great.

    Setting up the PKB has been one of the most useful projects I have; now if I can just remember to keep it updated often!

  • stockkid 1625 days ago
    I normally save things such as new vocabulary I come across, in English and other languages, steps to solve pesky linux issues, snippets, solutions from StackOverflow, etc. I documented my method and outcomes in the following articles:

    * https://www.getdnote.com/blog/how-i-built-personal-knowledge...

    * https://www.getdnote.com/blog/writing-everything-i-learn-cod...

  • lijogdfljk 1627 days ago
    Disclaimer: I don't currently save anything, because I'm building my own tool to manage this. My tool is partially designed around human retention of information and relationship between pieces of information, ala mind-mapping/etc - this influences what I plan on saving.

    In the past, I've used most of the software out there to lots of varying types of data. From birthdays, to work notes, goals, thoughts, plans and more. In the end I've found that the more dynamic pieces of information like notes, todos, plans and such are so flexible and hastily created that inserting them into some robust tooling felt unneeded. Furthermore, when trying to jot down ideas or software design plans I wanted something more free flying. A single input box didn't feel as open as a piece of paper. So for these pieces of data I've taken to writing into a dotted journal, and enjoy it quite a bit.

    My plans for the longer lasting PKB data are focused on retaining conclusions I create in life, the context of the time, and the sources that went into this conclusion. Politics, science, relationships and life. I realized that the information I build my identity around is, at least for me, all too easily forgotten. I decide that X political candidate is unqualified, but not why they were, and especially not what sources of information I got that from. Furthermore, I fear manipulation, and I want to keep track of facts, not simply be swayed by the masses of opinions on the internet.

    My primary goal for a PKB is to help me navigate the world of over information. Keeping track of sources, to help me back trace information if it's subject to question. I want to be able to back up things I "believe" with the facts that led me to that conclusion. My PKB is, I guess, a sort of version control for the mutable state of my mind. At least, that is what I am attempting.

    As an aside, this software is being designed around information sharing as well. I want the effort people put into research to be easily digestible, trackable, searchable and sharable. I've made a whole host of decisions and concessions around these goals for this software, and I hope one day it helps people, more than just myself.

    .. quite the long post. sorry :)

    • hanhongli 1626 days ago
      what is the name of the tool you are developing? would be happy to try it out.
      • lijogdfljk 1626 days ago
        Still too early for that unfortunately. I'm hoping to have the UX dogfooded in the next month or two, but I wouldn't go near it for another 6 months at least. I want to be able to destroy data should the need arise. Hope you understand :)
  • wh-uws 1628 days ago
    I use a Trello board as a personal knowledge base.

    There are lists of cards in no particular order that cover also sorts of random things like.

    - the research I did while buying a suitcase

    - random supplements I take

    - Buying an air purifier

    - how to hit the Philips hue API directly when their app doesn't work

    Basically any random thing I want to remember that doesn't fit neatly into one of my larger Trello boards

    • hanhongli 1628 days ago
      that is interesting information to save. basically it is a note that is hard to put into any category.

      do you save information such as your friends' birthday, favorite color etc. or information related to your colleagues, such spouse name etc.

      • wh-uws 1626 days ago
        For birthdays I use Google contacts / calendar.

        For stuff related to people I use Google contacts and if the information gets long enough I move it to Trello. Haven't really had the need though...

        But come to think of it I think you could probably put together a pretty solid crm with Trello custom fields