Geist Building a open source personal knowledge base

Posted by bryan
Jun 15, 2017 at 10:27 PM

Hi there, author here.

I am currently working on a major redesign of this project. I have learnt a lot the last few months about this topic and I hope to be able to combine it all into a nice UI. MadaboutDana is indeed right that the user interface is a big challenge here, but I feel like I have been making big strides in this area recently.

With regards to the comment on TheBrain, I agree with you that it is incorrect. What I was trying to say was that from what I have seen of TheBrain (I haven’t actually used it), the UI seems to be more focused around placing nodes above or below a node, basically creating multiple hierarchies with the occasional side-jump. My approach to this regard is different, I create a “master mind-map” basically, which contains the different subjects or collections. The subjects can then contain nodes which can arbitrarily link to nodes in any other subject.

My initial inspiration for the project was that I wanted a way to create highly linked notes for studying maths and other sciences. Therefore, I have put a lot of focus on the editor and tried to make the input experience as simple as possible, along with adding the editor features needed to do this (adding TeX, images, video, etc. to a node). I find that the network gives me a better mental image of what I am working on and therefore helps me to keep a good overview of what I am learning. I find that the more visual feedback the UI gives, the easier the learning experience becomes.

I will try to write more about the challenges and things I have learnt in the near future. I would love to know what it is that you look for in a personal knowledge base.

Ps: I am actually looking for a new name for the project with an available .com and/or .io domain, if you have any suggestions that would be greatly appreciated.

Best,
Bryan