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Discussion on: Do you write notes while developing? Where do you write them?

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Donald Merand • Edited

I alternate between paper notebooks + Quiver. Sometimes I use a touchscreen Chromebook running Squid as an "infinite whiteboard".

Nothing beats paper for speed of idea->representation. In my work, I find it best for the early stages of an idea, where thoughts are fleeting and getting them down fast counts most.

But, since we're coders, sometimes it's better to have a syntax-aware bucket where things can be copy/pasted or just worked out. That's what Quiver does for me. I also use it as a simple "knowledge base" that I can search for quick solutions to previous problems I've had. It's handy because it can do Markdown, LaTeX, code blocks, whatever, all in the same document.

I love Squid as an infinite whiteboard, and would almost recommend getting a tablet (or better, a touchscreen Chromebook that runs Android apps) just for this purpose. Some design problems just need to stretch out :) I tend to use this approach for ideas on which I need to iterate conceptually - because I can just keep moving to a different area of the "whiteboard" and try another approach, but then get a unified result. You can share the resulting document as a vector or raster image, and if you're a remote worker (as I usually am), you can join a videochat with the whiteboard open and screen-share it. This is almost as good as being in the room with a whiteboard!