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+[[!meta title="(Un)entangling projects and repos"]]
+[[!meta copyright="Copyright © 2023 Alexey Bochkarev"]]
+[[!inline pages="internal(2023/info/unentangling-nav)" raw="yes"]]
+
+<!-- Initially generated with emacsconf-publish-talk-page and then left alone for manual editing -->
+<!-- You can manually edit this file to update the abstract, add links, etc. --->
+
+
+# (Un)entangling projects and repos
+Alexey Bochkarev (he/him) - <https://www.bochkarev.io>, @bochkarev@qoto.org (Mastodon)
+
+[[!inline pages="internal(2023/info/unentangling-before)" raw="yes"]]
+
+Emacs provides a few excellent tools for working on projects through
+all their key stages. Orgmode is great for brainstorming, structuring
+and maintaining TODO lists, tracking time, organizing notes, and
+writing memos or reports. Many major modes help writing code, magit
+makes version control almost frictionless, and projectile helps with
+project management and navigation. However, I found a few situations
+when I wanted to separate the concepts of "project" and "source
+storage" (say, having a few version control repositories associated
+with a single "generalized project").
+
+In this talk, I would like:
+
+1. to describe a specific example of such situation,
+
+2. discuss a workflow aimed at managing such "generalized" projects
+and present my solution, based on a very simple ELisp "glue" on top of
+the functionality provided by package projectile.
+
+For example, consider a research project (think: applied mathematics with
+a heavy part of computational experiments). It might consist of:
+
+- The ``paper'' draft: some sort of final report source, usually in
+ LaTeX format, or orgmode exported to PDF via LaTeX. Version controlled
+ by git.
+
+- Numerical experiments: a separate folder, or even a separate git
+ repo. Contains the source code for numerical experiments and the
+ related technical documentation. Will be published along with the
+ paper.
+
+- A collection of intermediate memos (notes) sent to collaborators.
+
+- A collection of "raw" notes (lab journal), regarding what did I try
+ and especially what did NOT work and in which ways.
+
+This setting raises a few problems that all boil down to the necessity
+of having an easily accessible private notes file(s) associated with a
+few repositories at the same time outside of these repos. This way one
+can:
+
+- Maintain more granular project structure and TODOs while still having
+more concise TODO lists for the colleagues on a per-repository basis.
+
+- Maintain (project-specific) private technical notes, and maybe a full
+ lab journal both describing the "big picture" of the project and
+ containing the technical information.
+
+- Keep time tracking data private and outside of the source repositories,
+
+- Capture thoughts and TODOs to a single place from across a few
+ specific repositories.
+
+I propose to solve this problem by associating a single "notes folder"
+and a main `.org` file to each repository using the standard mechanism
+of directory-local variables on top of what is already provided by
+projectile package.
+
+
+# Discussion
+
+## Questions and answers
+
+- Q: Do you use these unentangling techniques in a blog or hosting a
+ zettelkasten?
+ - A: Well, I try to keep my "private notes" in something that
+ might qualify as a Zettelkasten, yes. I wouldn't say I 'host'
+ it --- it's not online. But yes, the whole point is that
+ these "private" notes are interconnected in a Zettelkasten-y
+ way (using org-roam package)
+ - Denote notes Silo features might be useful with your
+ workflow
+ - <https://protesilaos.com/emacs/denote#h:e43baf95-f201-4fec-8620-c0eb5eaa1c85>
+ - oh, thanks --- I'll have a look!
+- Q: What is the biggest unhappiness you haven't figured out for your
+ current workflow?
+ - A: Maybe I am still on the fence re: where do I structure my
+ TODOs and clock time. I tried to play around with the idea that
+ I structure the work in a repo, and then when I "clock in" it
+ saves time to a separate notes file instead... but it seemed a
+ little too complicated, to my taste.
+ - I feel that the time tracking also kind of annoying,
+ especially you forgot to clock on and all the things mess
+ up. So right now I'm just using a Pomodoro technique, 25
+ minutes, done, rest, 25 minutes, rest, and kind of repeating
+ that. And I'm quite happy with that.
+ - wait, what's that? 'org-pomodoro'?. sounds
+ interesting...
+ - It's not, you know, special for Org Mode. It's
+ kind of a general technique which you focus on a
+ small task for just 25 minutes, but at the time
+ you're super focused, 100% focused, and after that
+ five minutes you rest, and you're kind of repeating
+ these patterns over long sections. You can do four,
+ five, six of those sections, and it helps me to
+ focus over relateive long time.
+ - I also feel this might be something really
+ useful. Just haven't found a way to incorporate
+ it into my workflow
+ - for me it's quite simple is I can just use
+ a simple stopwatch that every 25 minutes
+ stop and reminde me  a rest. I believe
+ there's a lot of fancy clock specialized on
+ this this type of technique it's at the
+ core of this concept is really not a complex
+ idea.
+ - wait, I'm confused. So, that's outside
+ Emacs right? :-)
+ - Yes, the concept is outside of
+ Emacs, but I saw people using this
+ package. Let me search,:
+ <https://github.com/marcinkoziej/org-pomodoro>
+ <-- yeah, that one. Maybe I'll
+ have a look, thanks!
+ - Yeah, it's, again, if you're
+ familiar with the sports, it's
+ kind of making your long hard
+ working, breaking into a small
+ section, but I feel it's, you
+ have more kind of energy over a
+ long term, yeah.
+ - I like Using a weekly GTD log files for my TODO. That way I
+ can look back at them and not have my GTD to big. I like to
+ pull daily tasks from agenda
+ - and what do you do to transfer stuff between the weeks
+ --- a manual review? 
+- Q: Do you use project.el features as well, or just projectile.el
+ ones?
+ - A: Ugh. OK, I am at that point where I am not sure any more ;)
+ it is pretty well integrated to my Doom Emacs, so I am not sure
+ which one is that...
+
+## Notes
+
+- GNU Hyperbole already supports this with directory-specific quick
+ access button files (which can be Org files).  These can connect to
+ any number and type of document artifacts, including projects,
+ repos, directories, etc.  You don't need to put any code in
+ dir-locals either.  The directory/project-specific tags jumping
+ (automatically selecting appropriate TAGS files) is also built-in.
+ Have a look.
+ - Yes, there's clearly a few ways to achieve this. I have a
+ feeling Hyperbole achieves this, and much more. I wanted to have
+ something simpler, somehow.   (Yes, you seem to have some very
+ efficient techniques down; maybe you could utilize both). 
+ Thanks for the talk, it was good. Thanks for the suggestion,
+ tho!
+
+
+[[!inline pages="internal(2023/info/unentangling-after)" raw="yes"]]
+
+[[!inline pages="internal(2023/info/unentangling-nav)" raw="yes"]]
+
+