The apps we use shape who we are. Therefore it might be better to think twice before deciding on using an app for the long run.
Taking notes is a significant portion of the time you devote to your graduate degree. In that regard, using Obsidian for graduate students is one of those topics that comes up frequently for all the right reasons. Here’s why using such a platform is more important than you think.
Beyond note-taking, it might be better to build up a systematic platform of your thoughts, ideas, and essential references in a single place to converge all of your energy by thinking constructively to be successful with your degree.
Sounds amazing! But here is the tricky part. Finding the best platform to build that well-thought-out system is not that easy.
Why?
Because that choice can be subjective.
It might depend on your personality, value system, research area, and long-term goals. But the good news is some systems can be “moulded” into the system as you wanted it to be.
There are quite a few apps that can help you in that arena, and Obsidian is undoubtedly one of those versatile apps. But, how Obsidian is different from other available apps for graduate students?
Why Obsidian for graduate students, among all the other available options?
Here’s my experience with the note-taking apps I used and why I prefer Obsidian over all of them.
I had this idea of having an excellent note-taking system when I was an undergraduate student, and the most obvious option(Back in 2017) was Evernote, so I went with it. As of now, I have more than 2000 entries in different notebooks in Evernote.
Then I realized something. I couldn’t build any connections between my notes using this app. It’s just a stack of notes piling up without giving me any feedback. So I couldn’t “think” with Evernote.
So, I moved into OneNote, which had many more options than Evernote. But it has the same issue of not being able to link notes. Also, one note is just an infinite canvas, so that it can be overwhelming at times.
Therefore, I moved into Notion, which I still use but for different reasons. Although one can link notes and files in Notion, it is not built for that. Therefore, each time I tried to link notes, I worked against a system. And consequently, I felt mentally tired over time.
But still, Notion was one of my go-to apps at the time (But not for note-taking), so I stuck with it for a while.
Right before I graduated with my bachelor’s degree, I started questioning my judgment about the app I use for “thinking”. In order to be able to think freely, the app I utilize should not be “heavy”. Most importantly, I should be able to “link my thinking” so my notes would serve me as constructive in the long term.
This is where I moved into Roam Research, which satisfied both of the requirements mentioned above.
Perfect!
I found it after a handful of apps and three years of searching, I thought. But, a mental fatigue developed each and every time I used Roam Research. Although this app had all the features I wanted, something was missing. And it took me another year to figure that out, just before I started my graduate degree.
Although Roam Research is a simple, elegant and lightweight app, the problem was we do not have much control over the sorting of the files and file management within the app. Because of this issue, I felt a resistance to think about “ideas” on this platform.
In the long term, the essential quality of a note-taking system is how efficient the sorting and file management functionality is. But the linking notes was one of the top features of Roam Research.
Therefore, the question was, what is the app that I can use that already has the bi-direction linking option and better sorting and file management features?
This is when I first encountered Obsidian. Here are some of Obsidian’s unique characteristics that set it apart from its competitors.
Bi-directional linking
The best way to explain bi-directional links is in contrast to traditional hyperlinks. Traditional links allow you to link from one page to another, but the page being linked to has no idea anyone is linking to it.
It’s a one-way pointer. In contrast, bi-directional links establish a two-way connection between pages. This enables you to browse in either direction: follow a link to its destination and browse backlinks, which are all the pages that link to the current page.
Nowadays, many apps offer this functionality. But you have to be careful using this feature because you might be ended up with nothing but a bunch of disorganized files.
So, how do you make the files linked bi-directionally in a more accessible way? The best solution that works for me is to use tags.
But having too many tags can be overwhelming sometimes because you might not even remember the tags you created over time.
How to solve that?
The answer is nested tags.
Nested tags — better sorting
Although I’ve been using so many note-taking apps, I have never come across an app that offers this function.
Obsidian’s nested tags feature motivated me to stick with the app, and I’ve never looked back.
Why is it that important?
Assume if you create tags for your notes over one year. If you are actively using the app to write notes, at least you will end up with 100 independent tags.
As a result, the only option you had to sort things(tags) is now doing the exact opposite. I had this issue with Roam Research. (In Roam Research‘s defense, you could use its powerful query functions to sort things)
Although there are some other ways to deal with such a problem, you might be working so hard trying to work the system to have less time to get involved in the app constructively.
If the app does not get more user friendly over time, you should rethink the decisions you took to use that app in the first place.
In such cases, Obsidian is my go-to app because the app gets more productive in the long run.
Even better, you can rename a tag if you want. The app automatically applies those changes to each and every file.
File management
There are so many ways to manage your workflow in Obsidian.
Using tags (And nested tags) is one way to do it.
Also, you can use Obsidian’s file management system because it has a nested file management function.
Local file system
You own your files. You own your data.
This is one of the best reasons to use Obsidian for graduate students. Your files are well secured. You will not lose anything.
In our age when cloud services can shut down, get bought or change privacy settings on any day, the last thing you want is a proprietary format and data lock-in.
With Obsidian, you can store your data in a local folder. You do not have to leave your life’s work held hostage in the cloud again.
(But, I store my obsidian vault in cloud storage so that I can access the files from any of my personal computers. But that doesn’t change the fact that you have far more options than with any other similar software.)
It doesn’t get any simpler than this
Obsidian is built on markdown, a considerably more common, easy, and simple filesystem.
There isn’t much new to learn about working on Obsidian if you’re already familiar with markdown syntax. You’re ready to go!
You do not have to worry if you’ve never heard of markdown. Markdown is the most basic markup language available.
Graph view
Obsidian lets you view all of your files as a map, which comes in handy for various reasons.
However, numerous more note-taking apps on the market provide the same function.
So, what’s the difference? What’s new, and what’s better about this function in Obsidian?
To simply put, you can actually do something with it. You can use it productively.
Options that are available in the graph view allow you to see the connections between your files and tags in a constructive way that you can improve your thinking.
Final words
The apps we use shape who we are.
In that regard, Obsidian for graduate students would never be a wrong choice.
Even if an app has a high learning curve, it is always better to choose one that will make your life easier in the long run.
Obsidian is clearly one of the few apps on the market that can accomplish this.
Images courtesy: Thinking brain vector created by freepik – www.freepik.com , Photo by olia danilevich
