My Obsidian System: PANoRAMA

Hello! This is an abstract walkthrough of my PKM system that I use with Obsidian and Zotero. This is largely a mash-up of different systems, designed to fit my needs.

The name

In my mind, the system doesn’t have a name, but I needed to name it something for this post, so I’ve decided on PANoRAMA.¹

Here’s the folders:

• Projects: Short-term efforts with a specific final outcome. ²
• Areas: Long-term commitments requiring management in order to uphold a standard. ²
• Notes: Long-term ‘main’ notes, to be used in my writing. ³
• References: Notes taken during the act of reading. ³
• Archive: Projects which are complete, irrelevant or obsolete areas, and fully processed reference notes. ²
• Meta: Templates mostly. I needed a place for this kind of stuff, and ‘meta’ sounded rather nice at the time.
• Attachments: Images and diagrams used in any of the folders listed above.

Yes, this is a lot of folders, and each of them has a specific purpose and were only made after I determined a need for its existence.

PARA-inspired: Projects, Areas, Archive

If you’ve read Tiago Forte’s Building a Second Brain, you most likely recognized these three folders.

The truth is, I ripped them from his system and placed them into my own, because they fit my needs.

Resources is excluded because it’s already covered by References (see below).

“Notes”? Isn’t that a little broad?

Yeah, it is. Originally, my system only had a Notes folder and a References folder. I didn’t want to change it, so I left it.

This folder is analogous to the ‘main notes’ of the Zettelkasten method.

“References”?

The references folder is analogous to the ’literature notes’ from the Zettelkasten method.

Each file inside of this folder is a Zotero bibkey. I annotate my sources in Zotero and import them here.

The two oddballs: Meta and Attachments

Meta is a place for anything that my vault needs to function. Examples include templates, copies of configuration that I really don’t want to have to invent twice, and so on.

Attachments is what it sounds like: Images. I only add an image to a note if I feel like it helps to explain a concept better.

This system isn’t all-encompassing

My system isn’t an all-encompassing ’life OS’. Most notably, you’ll notice there’s no task management system or daily notes/journal system incorporated.

My Bullet Journal is my task management system and my place for journalling. I enjoy the feel of paper, and my Bullet Journal is always accessible, even when PANoRAMA is not. My Bullet Journal also has a slight air of serenity to it, which my Obsidian vault does not. The BuJo is a little order-making machine, and PANoRAMA is a system for processing information, which are two different tasks in my mind.

Please take inspiration, but don’t use this

This system has been battle-tested by myself for nearly a year. Emphasis on myself. I don’t intend this system to be used in situ inside of your Obsidian vault. Instead, please take inspiration and build your system to fit your needs. If our systems end up being identical, great! If not, also great! As long as it works for you.

Bibliography

• Ahrens, Sönke. How to Take Smart Notes: One Simple Technique to Boost Writing, Learning and Thinking: For Students, Academics and Nonfiction Book Writers. 1st ed., CreateSpace, 2017.
• Forte, Tiago. Building a Second Brain: A Proven Method to Organize Your Digital Life and Unlock Your Creative Potential. 1st ed., Simon & Schuster, 2022.