Hi community
Just discover the app and find it very interesting. I am an obsidian user, and mostly use the app to create note/howto with the different software, things I discover. My organisation in obsidian uses mostly folders where I put my notes. Folders can include folders (2-3 layers)
What would be the organisation to use with anytype?
Also my notes include text but also a lot of images to illustrate my howtos.
Thanks for advice
The most fundamental difference between Obsidian and Anytype is that Obsidian is natively hierarchical (folders and subfolders) while Anytype is natively non-hierachical (folders and subfolders are optional).
When you create a page in Obsidian, that page has to go in a folder, even if it’s just the root folder. But in Anytype when you create an object, that object just exists. It doesn’t exist anywhere specific, it’s just somewhere.
This means that “where” things are is completely up to you to design however you please. If you want hierarchy, you can have that. The main tool for building hierarchies is the collection. Collections are like folders in that you can put objects (including other collections) “into” them. They are unlike folders in that a single object (and collections are objects) can be put in any number of collections.
This makes it possible to build multiple parallel hierarchies that organize the same objects. For example, suppose I have a ton of recipes. I can organize them into three hierarchies, one that’s based on taste (e.g. sweet > fruity > strawberry pie) and another that’s based on culinary category (pastry > pie > dessert pie > strawberry pie). The two hierarchies are independent, and I can work on and use one without having to worry about the other.
But you can organize in other ways, too. Currently I favor custom indexes and sets in my own knowledge base. My custom indexes are my “canonical” way of organizing things, but unlike strictly hierarchical folders they can go in circles and intersect freely. Sets are Anytype’s main tool for dynamically listing, sorting, and filtering objects based on various criteria.
Together, my indexes and Anytype’s sets enable me to organize my knowledge base separately based on whether I want to add things or look things up. This both helps me save time, as well as makes it easier to expand or reorganize the knowledge base while controlling the spread of consequences that would otherwise result in extra work and confusion.
@MrsBasilEFrankweiler Love this clear explanation! I’m curious about your custom indexes, but having a hard time visualizing it. Do you just make a page with links, like an index of a book?
Sure, a key point is the somwhere.
The problem with that is that you can end up creating an object and later forget about it.
If you have a set of that type you’ll see it, otherwise you might just never remember it again.
Collections as you said are like folders: they nest like folders, but at the moment they don’t show up in a tree-like structure, you can drill collections one click at a time, but you cannot quickly expand a tree in the left panel to search something as you do in most file managers.
Sets are cool, you can organize data by using filters, in the end a set is like a table in a relational DB where you build views of your objects filtering on some tag or property.
The power is all there both containers allow for an object to lieve in multiple places (well links do the something similar in a filesystem).
Then for me things get messy when you start creating a lot of objects.
You can’t move an object by dragging it from a folder to another: with sets you have to predefine two sets with custom filters and later the modification of one or two tags/properties will move the object to the destination set.
With collections you have to change the assocaitions via the link-to.
Both are more powerfull and more time consuming than the folder abstraction.
Actually there is even a third option: to use objects like documents or pages as containers since you can embed anything in them.
All in all i think threre is ia moderately steep curve to get into it, cause you have to start thinking how to design your objects, not the data part per se which is usually obvious, or may be even already there in an existing type, but the metadata part: how to enable grouping by tag, cutom properties, labels, and soon you start thinking how to model the object you use for this tagging, cause the list of available tags becomes easely a mess, you’d rather have a property with a domain that is specific for what you are working with as object.
There are a couple of ways to organize your notes in Anytype.
As others explained about Anytype is that your notes are not organised in folders and therefor have no tree-like structure that many of us are used to.
Anytype notes are based on types and relations, as well as links to organize your notes. This is incredible powerful but requires are different mind-set from the user. Notes are trown into a big black void where can pull them out in any way we like.
The first way is links where we make a MOC (map of content) or index as some call them. This is just a page with links like a book index without the page numbers. An index can be simple or beautiful, build however you like. THe most simple and most popular is an outline index. For example:
Below each heading are links that take you to other MOC/index pages of the important topics in your life or notes. The cool thing is that if you add an index page to the sidebar, you kinda get the tree-like structure. These links could also be sets which brings my to the second way of organising via SETS.
Sets are a query based on a relation or type where Anytype pulls all the notes out of that big black void to organise them in a set view of your choice (list, table, kanban or grid). You can then filter and order them as you please.
The cool thing about sets is that ones they are set up, they add any new note that meets the requirements of that set. For example, you made a set based on the Movie type. Now it shows all Movie notes. If you add a new note with the type Movie it instantly shows up in this set.
Something I would advice is to make a set based on a relation that all notes have by default, for example creation date. Then make a list view and sort it by date opened or date last edit, this way you have a place to find all your notes, specially those you used recently. It’s an easy way to find notes you created on accident as well.
A feature like sets but different are Collections, these are set-like views but they are filled manual and are not based on a type or relation. This is a bit confusing for most however you can add and organise things yourself. These can be unrelated things that you want to collect in a single place.
For example you make a collection all about your house. Where you add household tasks, but also your furniture objects, your wishlist of things you want to have, people that life in your house, plants that are in your garden and perhaps your car stuff because you like to see it in the same place.
Al these things seemingly have nothing in common to make a set based on a relation or type (because they are all different types).
There are other ways to organise your Anytype but I think these are the main ways.
Thanks @Jeroen for these very detailed explanations! I guess I have been using a simple index already. 
Your example for collections is really good to visualize multiple objects vs sets which is only one object.
Hello Roms !
I had A LOT of folders in Evernote, and even more tags.
Despite all that, I just couldn’t find the stuff I wanted when I wanted.
I took advantage of starting all over on Anytype to try the P.A.R.A organisational method.
And I must say it does pretty well for me ! And Anytype is just PERFECT to record & display things in a organised manner & in a logical one AT THE SAME TIME !!!
I created 5 pages :
Each is a dedicated page, with a widget pointing to each of them.
Those pages have dedicated Collections (i.e. in Resources Pro, I link to collections for books, articles, general information, quotes …)
Each collection has a default object : Notes, and I created a different template for each collection (a tool of the toolbox, a summary of a method, or a smart tip…). In this way, I can see right away what kind of info it is.
I then sometimes add a relation between some elements when it makes sense or when I want to be reminded of a smart tip when I read a tool note, etc… that allows me to have a nice graph view where I can see different stuff with the graph’s settings:
Hi @roms ,
My organization has sone similarities with @GuipeL
My Favorites are sets of specific objects, it’s the core of my everyday use. Notes, Projects and Tasks have different relations and in order to filter them. They are all connected (a task can related to a project, etc…)
Dashboard is my home page, it’s a page with Inline sets (mostly same a favorites) and some random stuff I like to quickly reach.
By default a new entry in Anytype is a custom note object that will land in the tag filtered Inbox of my Notes set
I created 5 more main pages:
Inside of all these pages you will find a mix of sets (movies, books, recipes) or simple pages
Because I like to see them in small (Tree UI) with the icon on the left sidebar I created a “parent” page called Navigation
It’s a work in progress, hope it helps
I love the idea of inbox for new notes !!!
I actually wouldn’t use anytype for daily stuff usually since I use A LOT my ipad / pencil to write notes on noteshelf BUT if I did use Anytype as my only note taking system, I would definitely use that trick !
I had a homepage until today - I just realised it was a beautiful page with nothing else than links to the 5 main pages … no added value, gone !
How satisfied are you with tasks on Anytype?
I have a specific app for that which provides a very good service that Anytype wouldn’t before very very long (ios widgets, reminders, etc.) so will not move away from that but it looks very appealing to be able to have a single interface with everything.
About task management I miss reminders, bi-directional relations, dependancies, kanban on mobile and other things you can find in Notion that I still use when needed.
That said Anytype works for lots of my needs in addition of built-in tools of the Apple ecosystem.
And yeah a homepage with only links would be indeed useless but the it’s the magic of inline sets to have all work I progress stuff at a glance and being able to interact with it,
Mostly yes, although I do separate the links to “content” from the links to other indexes. Both lists may be sorted in some way particularly useful to each index, but that’s pretty much all the structure there is.
But I do add lots more structure by linking indexes among each other. I use them primarily to reflect the idiosyncrasy of my own mind, not to reflect the way things are naturally organized or the way they are organized by other people.
So for example, one of my index systems is about organizing Endeavors, which are a type of their own. To me, an Endeavor is a long-term goal (personal or shared) which may never be reached but is worth striving for. So this is big stuff like understanding the universe, recording and organizing history, learning to understand every human language, yada yada. I have a handful of indexes that help me get to them:
These indexes got created when I accumulated enough Endeavors to try finding their “essences”. The process of creating the indexes got me to notice that the Endeavors I entered tended to focus on recording things, finding things out, doing things that need doing, and doing things that are fun to do. This is useful to me because it codifies my habits of thought where I can see them and gives me a way to modify those habits later if I need to. It also gives me a way to separate concerns.
Take cooking, for example. I have three separate Endeavors which I call “cookery”, “cookics”, and “cookistry”. They are Documentary, Practical, and Artistic Endeavors, respectively (-ry indicates documentation; -ics, practicality; -stry, arts). “Cookery” is the endeavor to record and organize all the recipes there are, “cookics” is the endeavor to learn and practice all the cooking skills there are (e.g. different kinds of knife, how to dice an onion, don’t put water on a grease fire), and “cookistry” is the endeavor to produce reliably masterful and original meals (e.g. how tastes can be manipulated in combination and separation, how the size and shape of the plate can change how large the meal appears, how appetites for specific foods can be affected by previous meals over several days).
But that’s not necessarily how other people organize their cooking knowledge. Within my cookery system I have subindexes that organize recipes in the way that makes most sense to me. But if I’m entering extensive notes on, say, The Settlement Cook Book - Wikipedia, I might record it’s organization system in one of my “content” types.
Thank you for sharing your Endeavor organization! With a written journal/commonplace book, my stuff was all over the place and in multiple books. Seeing how you organize digitally is really helpful for me, especially broken into the 4 areas. I may borrow cookery and cookistry, but I’m gonna try something other than cookics, cookality maybe?
I can hardly blame you. I also have a practical Endeavor to treat and promote the health of the mind: Psychotics 
