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 am unable to 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 check — besides as an alternative of finding out, I am simply making an attempt to not overlook one thing I must do.

Whether or not I am in a gathering or researching a brand new matter for a narrative, I take notes as I am 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 these days, and I jot issues down alongside the best way. My favourite app to make use of is Obsidian. It is nice for protecting tabs on every kind of subjects, and a free, easy-to-use note-taking app that is change into fashionable with tens of millions of customers.

I am additionally an enormous 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 truly fairly shocking. Not solely is my handwriting atrocious, however my notes may be actually laborious to decipher. Fortunately, AI was in a position to assist me spot some patterns.

Obsidian is simple to make use of and easy to combine

I used to be happy with methods to carry it over

Should you’re utilizing Obsidian, you possibly can 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 fully 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 be aware with reminders for every day, together with one for freelance subjects I wish to analysis for story concepts. I will even make a day by day be aware for random ideas or issues I must 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 be aware individually. That may current a little bit of a problem, because you would possibly lose the connections between your notes — and the AI could not perceive how the whole lot suits collectively. So, utilizing Markdown hyperlinks is essential.

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 exploit Markdown hyperlinks in my Obsidian notes. I depend on these hyperlinks to attach my notes and assist me perceive which subjects are a part of the identical analysis thread. I do preserve them in folders in my vault, however reasonably than opening one be aware after which one other simply to toggle between them, a Markdown hyperlink lets me soar 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 once I use one of many many options that NotebookLM provides to assist folks examine and do analysis. In fact, 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 at the 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. That may appear to be a small factor, however I achieve this a lot analysis on totally different subjects that it may be robust to maintain monitor of the whole lot.

Granted, I do not at all times put the whole lot 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 instrument, Stories. I will add in a few of my scribblings (which can learn like they’re from a madman) and Stories 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 net. Since NotebookLM makes use of no matter I present as its supply materials, it might probably pull the solutions I want straight from my analysis.

Typically, I simply use it to summarize and assist me set up

I can ask inquiries to remind me in regards to the matter

I do a lot in Obsidian to maintain monitor of the whole lot happening in each my skilled and private life. Since I am at my laptop 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 prepare and customise with totally different options. Now that NotebookLM has a cellular 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 reap the benefits of 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 go looking deeper into the analysis. The extra I exploit these two and combine them, the higher they’re going to be, which is one thing I am genuinely so enthusiastic about.