Comments on: Lab Notebooking for the Software Engineer

By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 22:41:11 +0000

I set up a flat file blog on my private web space. I use 3-4 categories and put all the stuff into the blog. That way I have a searchable “notebook” that also works as some kind of a timeline.

By: RJ Ryan

RJ Ryan — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:30:45 +0000

Another effective tip (more in a research setting) is building your experimental tools such that every time you invoke them, they record the invocation (arguments, data used, etc) and prompt you for a description of why you are running the experiment and what you hope to evaluate. I’ve done this with my tools and as long as I take the time to fill in the description, the output data is annotated with the command I used, the data I used, and a description of what I was thinking at the time of running them. That way my results are self-documenting, and I don’t have to cross reference with my lab notebook.

By: links for 2010-06-22 « Daniel Harrison's Personal Blog

links for 2010-06-22 « Daniel Harrison's Personal Blog — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 02:05:53 +0000

[...] Made of Bugs » Lab Notebooking for the Software Engineer (tags: programming productivity development writing) [...]

By: David Bolton

David Bolton — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 11:36:49 +0000

I use and highly recommend a single file Wiki. My own favourite is Wiki on a Stick (Open Source in Sourceforge) though there is also tiddlyWiki. All the html, css and JavaScript is located in one file, so its very easy to back up. It lets you encrypt pages, handy for passwords etc.

It’s not big either, after two and a half years mine is up to 400 pages but is still less than 0.5 MB. I also use them for design documents and of course it’s platform neutral though different browsers work differently and my pref is Firefox 3.6. It includes search, formatting and pages can be deleted, renamed etc. I must confess I am a total fan and made a tutorial for working with it. http://cplus.about.com/od/thebusinessofsoftware/ss/woas.htm

WOAS – http://sourceforge.net/projects/stickwiki/ TiddlyWiki – http://tiddlywiki.com/

By: Looking Out To Sea » A simple lab book

Looking Out To Sea » A simple lab book — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 10:13:10 +0000

[...] seeing this post on keeping a “lab book” I realised I could make extra use of this environment variable that I already [...]

By: Kamil Kisiel

Kamil Kisiel — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 05:18:37 +0000

Best part about using paper is being able to draw. Sometimes nothing beats a quick sketch.

By: Paul Begley

Paul Begley — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 21:50:05 +0000

I use a TXT file and sync my data folder (of TXT files) using Dropbox. The sync is automatic, the overhead of notepad++ is nominal, and I find it more productive (faster, etc) than Google Docs.

I also maintain a marble notebook with daily notes and action items. I guy 1-2 dozen each Aug/Sept when they are on sale for under a buck.

Hard copy documentation can come in handy. I'm not sure what the legal requirements are now, but I sign and number pages in my notebook. In the distant past (80's, I'm old, stay off my lawn!), it came in handy working as an engineer (plastics and manufacturing) for two minor legal disputes. The contents of my notebook caused the other party to back down from IP claims.

By: Lars Wirzenius

Lars Wirzenius — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 21:36:37 +0000

@Vic Cherubini : a paper notebook has many benefits (durability, availability when computer is unavailable), but also some pretty serious drawbacks for computer related things. Most especially, it becomes really hard to copy and paste tricky text, such as URLs, command lines, or code snippets.

By: Lars Wirzenius

Lars Wirzenius — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 21:34:05 +0000

I wrote about my journaling (lab notebooking) habits a couple of months ago. Short summary: I write down my thoughts while designing things, and I use the ikiwiki software to do it.

I doubt the actual tool matters all that much, though. The important thing is to write down anything you might need in the future.

By: Brandon Croft

Brandon Croft — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 19:13:47 +0000

Tiddlywiki is a nice take-along wiki app. Works great as a notebook. http://www.tiddlywiki.com/