Platform-Agnostic JD Strategies

10-19 Concepts 11 Core Concepts
1

There was a good thread here on using multiple platforms, but it was from some months ago, so wanted to expand on it a bit.

Context:

I’m platform-agnostic, meaning that I have a MacBook Air, but also a ThinkPad that is dual-partitioned with Win11 and Linux.

In the post above, @johnnydecimal mentions the use of iCloud. I’ve found that iCloud doesn’t really handle “editing” different versions of a document well across machines. It handles viewing really well. Versioning not so much. Not sure if the sync is slow or if it’s an Apple thing or what, but for the purpose of me starting a Word Doc on the upstairs Mac Mini, then moving downstairs to the MacBook Air or PC, Dropbox works the best and has the fastest synch for opening/editing from different machines.

But I also love Google Drive, primarily for it’s ability to search within documents and find things easier and faster than iCloud or Dropbox. I’m wondering if anyone has or is exploring keeping the same JD folder hierarchy in all areas, but using something like MultCloud (I am not affiliated, just testing it) to sync Dropbox with Google Drive or iCloud, two-way, in near realtime?

There are things like collaborating on a document and search that Google Drive simply does better; so I struggle with synching both and trying to have my cake and eat it too, or keeping it simple and using Dropbox for one system and Google Drive for only a handful of documents that I need to collaborate on.

And yet if I want to use MS Excel or Word or most any other software program that writes locally - think MindNode, etc. - I can’t do that on Google Drive.

It makes sense to me - and I’ve been online for 28+ years - that one JD hierarchy is used and that it is kept simple.

Has anyone solved this problem yet?

2

I haven’t tried MultCloud, it screams unnecessary spending at me. I use the Apple ecosystem, DropBox and Microsoft email. I would personally go with keeping it simple with Dropbox and just using Google Drive for the collaborations.
I find creating and saving MS Word Excel etc easy on Mac as I just save straight to Dropbox, when I open the programme it automatically shows my history of most recent documents used. and I think that’s good enough for me?
I personally think keep things simple but you’ll never find an app etc that does everything? There will always be something missing.

3

Great points. I’d tend to agree with you. And search has gotten better with Mac OS and Dropbox via the Finder. Thanks so much for taking the time to respond.

4

Yes, Apple does keep getting better and better tbh. You are welcome, I hope it was helpful.

5

We have this problem at JDHQ. We keep the JD business, D85, on a few machines and they all Syncthing to each other. There’s a ‘server’ (Mac mini w/ 16TB attached disks) in the kitchen which always has a copy of everything, and it handles cloud backups and so on.

If we both try to edit a Pages document in this structure this just doesn’t work. Conflict city! Ugh.

Pages does have collaboration features: the document just needs to be in iCloud, and you need to properly ‘invite’ the other person via the built-in mechanism. We don’t bother; I just know when Lucy’s in a document and I leave it alone.

We – the humans – haven’t really solved this yet. Dropbox still seems to be the gold standard for sync. iCloud is okay: I use it because it’s the default and I have to pay for 2TB anyway as we have home security cameras.

Why don’t I use iCloud for this business system? Local disk space. I need the granular control that Syncthing gives me so that I can specifically not synchronise folders to this MacBook Air, which only has a 500GB SSD.

If you’re a Microsoft shop it makes sense to use OneDrive.

So yeah … just gotta decide on a thing and live with its problems.

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6

If I may suggest something for the next “build” of the guidebook, in Area 56 of the guidebook, when discussing database options you mention Airtable and Sharepoint. As I mentioned in this thread, I’m trying to build something that can be used across operating systems and devices. I might suggest that you include Notion (https://www.notion.so/) in addition to the ones you’ve listed. Personal version is free.

I’m finding that the web version of notion is excellent in terms of search accuracy and searching options, tagging, etc. There are Mac and PC apps for it as well.

In the guide you mention to think of 00.00 Index as your system. For me it feels like a “roadmap” to my system, which consists of many components.

In terms of cross-platform, accessible from anywhere, on any device, functionality, using a Google Doc makes sense to me for the “one note for the index” method. Notion for the database method.

I think one could also use JDex for a browser bookmarks hierarchy - something that, for me, is always a mess. But it may make more sense to just have one link on the browser to 90-99 Resources in Notion, which would house the bookmarks hierarchy. That would eliminate the need to recreate bookmarks on other browers if, for example, you sometimes use Chrome and other times Safari.

Right now I’m trying to work the problem of where to house “Resources”. My areas are Personal, Business, and Work. I have resources I use for each area, so I’m thinking it may make sense to house them in 90-99 Resources as it’s own area rather than creating a Resources for each area, since there are some I use for all areas.

Assigning it as 90-99 leaves me room to add other areas below it. How do you handle Resources (bookmarks, etc.) in your index?

7

Yes! Roadmap is a great way to describe it.

There’s a standard zero for that! :slight_smile:

Good idea re: Notion. It’s really powerful.

8

Thanks. So do you use the standard zeros in every Category? I ask because I just added them to 00-09 System Management, and it looks like there is an individual note for System bookmarks, which would mean potentially 99 other bookmarks notes, which (to me) seems like it would not play nicely with search?

9

Yeah, theoretically.

But I’ll only create AC.04 if I need a ‘bookmarks’ in that category. So in reality I have a small handful, not 99.

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