When I first started working with computers, I had to remember things. Especially the details: what the Samba network name was, the syntax for setting up FreeS/WAN, and what tools I had tried to configure the network that didn't work, and why they didn't. My solution was a boring Mead notebook. I dumped everything in there, and referred back to the notes if I had to work with the system again.

Then, I found out that I was using the notebooks for todo lists. And addresses. This had a couple of bad effects: one, if I wrote a todo list and then wrote some more notes I had to flip back to where I was to find out what I should be doing... and two, there was personal information in there (i.e. do laundry) that really I didn't want to see when looking through the notebooks later.

So I got another notebook for personal stuff. One notebook for work, one notebook for home. Simple. I'd use the notebook at home for all my personal stuff and that would be it.

Then I started using the personal notebook as a diary. This was actually a good thing (you can learn a lot from reading through old diaries), but it did have the unwelcome side effect that I was terrified to go to Safeways with it.

So I split the personal notebook into a Todo list and a diary. Write essays in one, write tasks in the other. This actually worked until I replaced it with the GTD system I use currently, where diaries are treated just as another inbasket item.

For work, I ran into another problem after a few years. I have several different projects that I'm juggling, as well as my own personal projects. Some of these are at different stages i.e. I'm writing code on one project, reviewing code for another, and looking at product options for another. When all of these got hammered into one notebook, the end result was not great.

So the current system. I buy about 10 notebooks at a time. I write the name of the project on the front of the notebook, and the start date, and use the notebook for the project only. I write down technical information, logs, and caveats. No tasks. When the project is finished, it gets retired, and I can then look back through it for a post-mortem.

This probably isn't the best system, but it's the best I've found so far. Writing things down in a notebook gives a permanence to thought that I just don't get when I use scrap paper or a PDA.