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## Simple or not, what works for others might be a distraction for you I’ve been using one big text file (OBTF, or 1-N) as a capture point and scratchpad, for more than two years now. I love it! But this week I considered going back to using separate files for my daily notes. Again. They look so cute, sitting there all in a row! And they’re baked into Obsidian, so what’s the problem? Lots of people have used them for years and swear by them. And change is as good as a holiday, right? So I set up a daily note workflow. Capture from all my devices via Drafts, check. A page in Obsidian that shows all daily notes on one page as if they were one continuous file (ersatz OBTF), check. But half an hour in I stopped. It didn’t matter how sweet or OBTF-like the setup was, something wasn’t feeling right. Shifting to one big text file felt freeing. Many people do well with daily notes; I find them a gateway to distraction and unnecessary complexity. The principle here is to do what feels right to you, no matter how enthusiastic others are about the alternatives. ### Find your simple, hold it close And so I am going to leave daily notes (in separate files) alone. I’ll continue throwing every random thought and note into a single text file, because that’s what feels most natural. I’m not trying to recreate a digital bullet journal, and I’m no longer dividing groups of dated entries with Markdown headers. I have a set of basic tags for common themes, but other than that my text file is like a paper notebook. When I want to find where I wrote that thing last week, I flick back through the pages and look for it. To do the same thing in a text file I scroll, or enter key words into the search bar. Here’s what I’ve learned from my separate daily notes experiment. A practice may make a lot of sense and be widely used by many people, but if it distracts you or makes your life more complicated, you will be better off without it. A practice may appear ‘simple’ and still have the effect of complicating your life. Your system should be no simpler than is needed to get your work done. You can try and dissect the whys and wherefores of the productivity practices that do and do not work for you, but you don’t need to do that before getting on with life. Don’t let an incomplete analysis stop you from getting on with your most important work. * * * **_This post was written on a computer, not by one._** _💬 I love to hear from readers! email hello at ellanew dot com or message me on Mastodon. Follow my RSS feed https://ellanew.com/feed.rss, or sign up to receive a (mostly) weekly plain text themed email._ Follow my 2026 Inktober posts _If you’ve found value here, I invite you to share this post with someone you think will appreciate it or make a contribution to my support jar._ You might also like my plain text productivity resources.

Minimal, keyboard-first terminal note-taking scratchpad (prebuilt binary)

RL's Scratchpad

As a writer, my phone is an extension of my brain. For years, Apple Notes has been where I've quickly scrawled half-baked ideas, pasted web clips, or drafted grocery lists. It was fast and reliable, but I treated it strictly like a digital scratchpad: great for throwaway jottings, but underpowered for real writing. Whenever it came time to build a structured outline or draft a lengthy piece, I naturally immediately closed the app and went somewhere else.

As a writer, my phone is an extension of my brain. For years, Apple Notes has been where I've quickly scrawled half-baked ideas, pasted web clips, or drafted grocery lists. It was fast and reliable, but I treated it strictly like a digital scratchpad: great for throwaway jottings, but underpowered for real writing. Whenever it came time to build a structured outline or draft a lengthy piece, I naturally immediately closed the app and went somewhere else.