Please note that this is an ongoing project so I will edit and add to this post as I go along.
In the other two posts, I think I have covered the basics of how to use the Zkn3 Zettelkasten so the idea of this post is to cover all the little tweaks and more rarely used features as I come across them. They will be arranged into subject catagories but I will add to them on an ad hoc basis as I discover things.
Versions
I have been using Daniel’s final version of October 2015 (v3.27) quite a lot recently as it retains some features that I like, such as being able to duplicate a Note from the File menu. However the latest version August 2022 (v3.2022.8) is also useful, so I use that as well and there does not seem to be any problems between the two versions and the dataset. The August 2022 release has developed an annoying ‘bug’ whereby it displays two copies of every Note after I save an Edit, which Daniel’s version does not do. Apologies in advance, if I describe a feature that does not seem to be on your version of Zkn3. Just use Daniel’s 2015 version and then go back to the one you were using.
Editing Zettles (Notes)
Adding footnotes into your Zettel
Although you can alreay add your main source for the Zettel by using the Author window, in some cases you might like to add some further references into your text as footnotes.
First of all the source needs to be in the Authors list. If not while in the Editing window, press the AUTHOR button on the menu bar and this opens a sub-window which allows you to manually write in the reference or copy and paste it from Zotero or other citation managers and you can set the Bib_Key yourself.
Then a) place your cursor in the textbox where you want the reference to appear b) go to the Author window on the right and highlight the reference that you need c) go to the Menu Bar and press the FOOTNOTES button. This will insert a code looking like this: ([fn 55]) into the text which will appear as a Footnote in the Zettel. The reference will sit in the Author box at the bottom of the Zettel window. Adding a second footnote will add another short section of code and another reference into the Author box. It looks like a Harvard style reference i.e: (Davie 2020) and will hyperlink to the reference both below in the Author box and to the right in the Author window.
However the Author list can quickly become quite large and then challenging to use, so if wanting to use this feature quite often, an alternative way is to copy and paste the citation from Zotero directly into the Zettel text box at the bottom. Then right click to bring up the context sub-menu, select FORMAT and then CITE. This will add [q] [/q] around the tect and highlight it in light grey. Prefix the reference by a suitable number and then add that number into the text at the appropriate place. Highlight the number, right click to bring up the context sub-menu and select FORMAT and then SUPERSCRIPT which places this code [sup]1[/sup] into the text to make the number looking like a Chicago reference.
ADDING THE ZETEL TITLE FROM THE TEXT BODY
I find this quite useful while writing the Zettel for the first time. Often a key phrase will suggest itself as the title of the Zettel. In which case, highlight the relevant text in the main body, right click to get the sub-menu and then select ‘Set Selection as Title’ and this will insert the highlighted text into the title bar.
Links Tab
When you select a Note and then look at the Links tab, what this shows you is all the other Notes with the same Keyword(s). The column headed Relevance grades these Notes by the number of Keywords shared 16 for one Keyword in common, 32 for two Keywords in common and so on. Really only works for Notes that have three or more Keywords but with these it can really bring together two Notes from other sides of the Zettelkasten which you might not normally associate with one another.
Clusters Tab
This is another way of looking at Keywords and their associated Notes. With this approach you select a Keyword and press on the little arrow on the left. This will display all the other Keywords that appear in the Notes featuring the original Keyword. The numbers of those Notes are given in the box at the bottom. Selecting any one of these Keywords will show you all the Notes with both those Keywords and the Keywords that they both share. Original Keyword + Selected Keyword. You can continue selecting Keywords and each selection adds another level, so original keyword + Second Keyword + Third Keyword + Fourth Keyword. Holding the pointer over the Note Number will give you its title and clicking on it will open the Note in the Main Text Window. Again the idea is to identify Notes in common that may not sit close to each other in the Note Sequence (Folgezettel).
Having found these cross Zettelkasten connections, one could either link the relevant notes by Cross Reference, or they might be attached in the Note Sequence or if that particular group of Notes is relevant
Outliner
Archiving and Removing Outliners
There are two ways to ‘save’ your outliner by going to File/Export and saving it as a Word document or any of the other file types that you normally use. The second way is to go to File/Archive which saves the whole Outliner as a compressed (zip) XML file which can be re-opened by going to File/Read Archive which restores the whole thing as a working Outliner.
In order to remove an Outline from the list, first of all Archive it and then select the top Bullet point in the left hand screen and then go to Edit/Remove which will remove (and destroy,) your Outliner. Or Right click on the top Bullet point and select Remove from the pop-up menu. Either way will delete the Outliner.
Comments
I like to write comments in the Outliner to remind me of the key points of that particular Bullet Point or Zettel Note. Make sure that you have Comments display from the View menu. Select a Bullet Point or a Note in the left hand screen and then click on the Comments button on the tool bar or right click and select Comments from the pop-up menu or ctrl+k. If you use the Comments to retain information about the structure of your Outliner, then selecting ‘Comments only’ from View menu allows you to get an idea of the structure as it develoips.
Textual Notes
When building the structure in the Outliner, I find it quite useful to add a Zettel note into the start of each main bullet point where I can summarise what should appear in that section. These notes have their own place within the Zettelkasten, their own little Note Sequence and are linked by the Keyword ‘Textual Notes’. This means that I can work on the structure of the Outliner while in the main part of the Zettelkasten just like I would with any other Zettels. This helps me orientate myself when adding Zettels into the Outliner as to what should go where. If I have an idea or insight, I can quickly add it into the relevant Zettel and then move on. Later on it will help me when working on the Outliner and keep me on track.
Moving Notes between Zettelkasten
or even combining entire Zettelkasten together
I maintain several Zettelkasten on different but related subjects and been toying with the idea of creating a Grand Zettelkasten to hold everything on one place. Why not? Well several reasons, firstly the Authors and Keywords lists could easily become very large, as could the Note Sequence. This could slow down searches, make inputting slower and generally become unwieldy. The potential advantages were in the connections between seemingly unrelated subjects.
For instance, adding my Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945 Zettelkasten to my Soviet Union Zettelkasten produces a radically different set of results. Mark Edele in his book “Stalinism at War” argues that for the Soviet Union, the Second World War started (as it did for China,) in 1937 with the Japanese attempt to take Kalinin Gol in 1937. From this viewpoint, the Soviet Union faces a potential two front war against Germany and Japan and this helps explain many of the actions of 1939-1941 in Western Europe.
So I might create a set-up where I have a number of Zettelkasten as stand-alone porjects and then a 'Master Zettlekasten’ with everything in it. To do this I would need to have the ability to a) combine Zettelkasten b) combine selected parts of a Zettelkasten with another one c) Maintain a Log to record what went into the Master Zettelkasten to avoid duplication.
Warning
If you are going to attempt this, do it with copies of your Zettelkastens, so that the original is retained unsullied. It’s bound to go wrong at some stage and you will need to retrace your steps.
Saving or Copying Zettelkasten
Go to File menu and select Save As… and this will create a copy of your entire Zettelkasten. For added security keep your Zettelkasten in seperate folders
My file structure
I keep my my data in a folder called ‘Zettelkasten Boxes’ with a seperate folder for each Zettelkasten which contains the .zkn3 files, the backups, Outliner printouts, etc.
The Experimental folder contains copies of Zettelkasten that I can play with in safety.
Merging two Zettelkasten
This is the result of my Frankenstein experiments so far…. To simply take one Zettekkasten and merge it into another one seems to work reasonably well.
Tidy up your both your Keywords lists and Authors lists in both Zettelkasten that you want to merge. Because my focus is the Soviet Union, I tend to name Keywords with the convension of a Prefix: if the Keyword relates to anything else. So ‘Army’ relates to the Soviet Union, while other references have a prefix like: ‘American: Army’ or ‘China: Army’
Copy both files to a seperate folder on your computer. (File - Save As) (name the files as something different from the original to save confusion)
Use the larger of the two (in my case ‘Soviet Union at War’ with 2,000 notes) as the base Zetterlkasten.
Open the other one (in my case ‘Axis and Allies’ with 500 notes) and select File - Export which will look something like this and produce a .zkx3 file.
Exporting a Zettelkasten to a .zkx3 file
5. Open the base Zettlekasten (Soviet Union at War) and select File - Import and select the .zkx3 file that you have just created.
6. Press the Save button to save the combined Grand Zettelkasten of 2,500 notes.
7. Then you need to record exactly which Note number and the time stamp you used for the merging. Subsequent mergings can start from this point. My cunning plan is to record this by inserting a new ‘Textual Note’ into the Note Sequence which captures both the place and the timestamp. Remember that you can have the Zkn3 Preferences set to re-use old deleted Note Numbers, in which case use the datestamp in preference to the Note Number, as your key record.
My observations:
Notes merge successfully and retain formatting
The imported Notes are renumbered (deleted Note Numbers are ignored so at least the new Notes are all in one sequence.)
Note sequences are retained however you will have to manually link your imported Note Sequences into your current Sequences at the upper levels to make them one whole Zettelkasten.
Note datestamps do not change and retain the original and the modified date does not change either. [Further research is needed here but I could use the Note Number as identifier, turn off the deleted note re-use feature and use the modified date stamps in the original Zettelkasten to identify altered or edited Notes.]
Keywords merge and Notes retain their Keywords
Authors merge and Notes retain their Author links
Internal hyperlinks within the Note text sometimes are retained but sometimes they break. Now, I use Index Notes as entry points to sub-sections of my Zettelkasten which have hyperlinks to other Index Notes, as an aid to navigating around the Zettelkasten. Some of these survived while others ended up looking like this:
[z 210809142230113Axis and Allies 7WR02154744]Level 1: Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945[/z]
Clearly an impossible Note Number (italics) but the Note Title is retained (bold) and so easy to find (it’s 1952) and once corrected it works:
[z 1952]Level 1: Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945[/z]
So no data lost and these links can be cleaned up as and when you some across them.
Images and Attachments may not work initially. So, I recreated the sub-folders of the original Zettelkasten in my Grand Zettelkasten Box folder, creating folders for ‘img’ and ‘attachments’, copying over the images and data as well. Then I went to the top menu Bar and selected Zettelkasten - Preferences and chose the Directories tab and put in the pathway to these new folders. Most things now worked but as usual there were one or two exceptions, the data was there, so just remake the links. Not sure why these things happen?
So all in all pretty successful I would say.
Export/Import File Types
For reference these are the file types that you can use for Exporting/Importing from Zkn3:
File - Import
Zettelkasten files Zkn3 (used to merge two Zettelkasten together)
Old Zettelkasten files Zkn
Old Metafiles csv
Authors from Bibtex (add Authors from one Zettelkasten or Citation Manager (Zotero))
File - Export
MS Office .docx
OpenOffice .odt
Markdown .md (see below for transfering to another Zettelkasten programme)
RTF (useful for extracting information from the Zettelkasten)
XML
CSV
HMTL
Text
LaTex
Zettelkasten .zkn3 (used to merge two Zettelkasten together)
Export/Import parts of a Zettelkasten
Either you have created a really good group of Notes or you want to add a new part of a Zettelkasten to your previously created Grand Zettelkasten. So how do you move a select group of Notes over to another Zettelkasten?
I am going to explain this backwards (and hopefully you will see why in a minute.) There are 3 ways to export a group of Notes from a Zettelkasten.
File - Export and select ‘Export Selected Notes’ and enter the Note Numbers into the little box. Probably only useful up to 20 Notes but straightforward.
From the ‘Search Results Screen’ File - Export will save all the Notes from that search as a .zkx3 file which can then be imported into another Zettelkasten.
From the ‘Outliner Screen’ File - Export - As Search Result will display all the Notes from the Outliner in the ‘Search Results Screen’ and from there they can be saved as a .zkx3 file. Ironically File - Export - Current Outliner does not allow use of the .zkx3 file type. This is more about printing out or displaying your Outliner outside the Zettelkasten.
As you can see from this list if you can get your Notes into a Search Result or Outliner then you can export them and here are just some of the ways that I have found that you can do this:
Note Sequences - one way of doing this is to add each Note to the Outliner individually since you cannot select more than one Note at a time.
However if you select the top Note of a Note Sequence and then go up to the Note Sequence Tab on the top Menu Bar, it will allow you to either export that group of Notes as a .zkx3 file or as a Search Result.
Keywords - click on the Keyword in question in the key word list and it displays the Notes in the Search Results Screen.
Authors - the same
Titles - if you can get the list to display your Notes more or less together, then you can use the Ctrl key to select multiple Notes and then Right Mouse click and select Add to Outliner to add several notes all at once. Or the Titles Tab on the top Menu Bar will allow you to export ALL the Notes directly as a .zkx3 file.
Bookmarks - Collect Notes in a Bookmark and then Right Mouse click to send them to the Outliner.
Or go up to the Bookmarks Tab on the top Menu Bar and select Export, select the Category of the Bookmark and it will allow you to create a .zkx3 file.
Cluster - Find a Cluster and again the Cluster Tab on the top Menu Bar will allow you to export it as a .zkx3 file.
I have highlighted the five most useful methods of exporting large groups of Notes. Personally I like the idea of being able to ‘vet’ the list before exporting it and so tend to favour the Outliner method since it gives you complete control. But the Note Sequence/Search Results method is pretty useful and reliable too.
keeping your grand zettelkasten up to date
So now you have the tools and methods to keep your Grand Zettelkasten up to date. In a few months time, go to one of your smaller Zettelkasten, find the Marker Note and from this export Zkx3 files which contains:
Notes with a higher number
Notes created after the timestamp (if you have the ‘re-use deleted’ Note numbers set.)
Notes which have been modified after the timestamp. (you will have to manually replace the originals in the Grand Zettelkasten with the updated one)
So now if your Zettelkasten becomes huge, unwieldy with slow searches, you can maintain a smaller ‘working’ sub-Zettelkasten on the current projects and feed the results into the Grand Zettelkasten.
Items still to discover
The right click context menu contains a reference to the ‘Steno-List’ and allows you to add terms to this list. But other than this I cannot find how you would use this feature or what context you would need it. Easily adding common phrases with just a few key strokes? Or is it a vestige of some long forgotten feature?