In college I will attend courses just like at Stanford. I already use my PowerBook to write all my daily notes on derbaum.com. I want to write my lecture notes on my notebook as well. It would have many advantages. But, besides all that great technology, I need to be aware that it should never be more complicated, or slower to write, than a college block. So in order to collect and share all this information, I need a working system. A System that supports me, instead of holds me back. If I can not add a formula or graph right away, the system failed. The focus should be on the content and not on where to save or how to format my lecture notes. I will need to prepare myself in advanced so everything works smoothly right from the start. That's why I need a simple, working system to write all my lecture notes. The system needs to be extremely flexible, but still based on structure to make it easily accessible. The big test will be my summer session this year, where I will actually sit in classes and try it out.

A few things to do

• Since lessening to the lecture and watching the blackboard is the most important part in a lecture, I need to be perfect in typing.
• All things like formation text, mathematic formulars, tables,... should be possible while I'm totally focused on the class (not on the task of writing the formular).
• The process of starting, saving, editing, linking,... Lecture note should be totally easy or done in the background.

Things I can do with PHP

• file management
• text manipulation
• the starting, saving, editing, linking,... Lecture note process
• sharing lecture_notes
• sort, search,... Lecture notes

Things I can't do with PHP

• drawing small notes, graphs,...
• spell checking
• mathematic formulas

Programs watch out for

• Mathematica 4.1 (export in MathML)
• MS Office v.X (templates*, Apple Script)

Why don't base the hole system on the code of derbaum.com?

• show_lecture_note($class, $lecture_note_id)
  Almost like derbaum.com, $class would be $topic, $lecture_note_id would be $story_id.
• Would it be a problem if I have hundreds or even thousands of $stories?
• What would I have to rewrite?
  • STYLE! First of all I wouldn't want the left bar like on derbaum.com
  • The get_the_story_formatted as well as the submit_a_story function would be replaces with something which fits my needs.
• Ether way to keep on working on derbaum.com, with the idea in mind that I may use the code to collect lecture notes is the right way for now.
  • Work around the topic system.
    • Each topic has a folder where I can add pictures, tables,...
    • Better way to link to the folder (I could replace "/" with "pictures/NAME_OF_TOPIC/").
    • A description for each topic is very important in case I use the system for my lecture notes because I will probable show lecture notes (stories) by courses (topics) instead of a chronological order.
• I will run two (compatible) system so it would be easy to link around, just like the sections system on Slashdot. Which brings up the crease thought that I could try the, much more powerfully, slashcode. Ahhrr...
• Two equal programs, so what if I improve one of them, how can I upgrade the other? (Templates?!)
• Actually I can't see a good reason why not using the derbaum.com-code, it's just a question of adjustment

Labels: Apple, Stanford