Zettelkasten Note-taking process

Notes

1. Fleeting notes These are notes that come to you in the moment, on the fly. Write them down and file them away later.
2. Literature notes Write down notes about the contents of what you read, what you think the piece is saying, and a selective amount of quotes. Literature notes should also come with bibliographical information if necessary.
3. Permanent notes These are the refined notes that go into the slip-box. The above two forms are mostly fleeting notes. You (I) should go through the notes I take daily and organize them into permanent notes. This stage is not for collecting ideas (that’s 1 and 2) it’s to develop the ideas you’ve already written down. Each note should have its own idea and should be expressed as though being written for someone else.
4. File the permanent note
   1. Associate it with similar notes Make links and back-links to it

The rest of the steps discussed in chapter 2.1 are omitted, as they can be summarized as:

• To start writing a paper, find a topic on something you’ve taken notes on
• Interpret your notes to make an argument
• Write a rough draft, proofread, and submit