I am just setting it up.
Seems perfect as you can add folders, subfolders, links to other apps.
With Anydock, quicksave to folders, add note to folders, lightning fast quick open fuzzy search…
I am just in the process of modifying official Alfred workflow to work specifically for J.D. index search, add notes to id and such.
Just interested if anyone thought of it and what are the opinions…
I mean reading through the website again.
When writing an index note, you are supposed to put where the item is, keyword and all in the note.
With Anybox, you can just send link to the item to the appropriate I.D. With quick save, add a keyword, add a tag if you’d like, rename the link, it even automatically gets the apps icons that it leads to.
Alfred workflow allows you to add notes directly to I.D. If that is something you want to do.
Quick open and fuzzy search on a hotkey is fastest ever.
Add opening the link in default app, revealing in Anybox with shift, revealing in finder with command or copying mmd link to the item with control.
Not to mention you can have smart filters for projects or most used I.D. A click away on Anydock.
It should in theory act as a perfect “dashboard” for J.D. index?
This sounds like contextual computing at it’s finest and what J.D. Index is supposed to be if I understood correctly.
I am not sure if I just had the best idea ever and no one has thought of it or has this been considered already and I am missing something here?
I haven’t had the chance to try it myself and don’t have the capacity to take on anything new at the moment, but I’d be really interested to hear how it goes for you
Here is a little screenshot, but I haven’t had chance to put all of it in yet.
I know it is nested but you could flat it out (as I said it is W.I.P.). The beauty is you can use tags or folders and the idea is instead of using notes and putting links in them, just using a folder and put the link in it.
This screenshot of my project folder with deeplinks might make more sense.
So I have a project, open quick search, type it’s identifier and it offers me three links related to the project and I decide if I want to go to the task manager, see my notes or see my project support whiteboard. (DEVONthink should be there but I am still working on it.)
I can also copy link with a modifier for pasting it somewhere else, reveal the link in AnyBox with another modifier, reveal it in Finder (or DEVONthink) if it is a file or simply open it in whatever app it is stored.
So if you translate that to J.D. Index - You create “buckets” xx.xx and just add links to where the thing is.
It kind of defeats the purpose of having a note and writing where something is. Instead it is a “dashboard” taking you directly to it.
That said, it does support notes so if you would like to keep traditional - note per I.D. approach, you could totally do that.
(The way I see it is - the folder is a note, but instead of having to paste MarkDown link you have a nice UI with the icon of where the item is stored. Also AnyBox has quick save link to folder hotkey which makes it I think easier then opening a note app and pasting the link it or writing down where the thing is)
And you can also add a note to your “bucket” be it I.D. or area describing it or keeping updates.
Hell it even supports keyword expansion to launch a link. So you could set the keyword “jjd22.15” (or whatever you choose) and be taken directly to your most used I.D.
Oh and did I mention that not only does AnyBox automatically assigns the icon of the app that link came from, but also replicates the name of the item? So for example if in Muse my whiteboard is already named PRJ001::WS00 - J.D. and I press copy URL or use Hookmark and invoke quick save and send that link to the folder (I.D.), this is how that link will look when I open AnyBox without me lifting a finger:
That is if you just hit save and don’t interact with renaming text field. I do add an app identifier at the end - MU just in case I am searching for something and forget any other naming convention, I can always rely on the suffix. Or if I am searching a worksession that will have links to 5-6 different apps, I can drill down which app I want to open.
It’s worth mentioning that both quick open and quick save in AnyBox are global functions that do not require opening the app, as you can see from the screenshot just a little Spotlight like search tab appears. And it is the fastest and most accurate I have ever come across.
Give me couple of days to get this up and running the way I want it to and I’ll update this thread with bit more detailed workflow/usecase.
In the meantime, if anyone is interested, this video of Lee Garett explaining how he manages his projects using AnyBox from the episode of Mac Power Users will make sense of everything (probably much better then I tried). It is where I got my idea from. How Lee Manages Projects : ScreenCastsOnline
You can get a 7 days free trial to watch it as the preview on YouTube does not even come to using AnyBox.
That’s it from me, sorry for a long post, as you can see I am excited about this.
Any feedback is welcome and fingers crossed I am back here in a couple of days with an fully working new system for running a J.D. Index.