[Framework Review] Forever ✱ Notes: Part 1
Rejoice, Apple-heads. There is a way to squeeze even more power out of Apple Notes. Though this way might not be covered in roses…
I have an Apple fetish…
I could use plenty of outstanding productivity software instead of built-in Apple apps. In fact, customers and employers often impose it on me. Yet, when organising my workspace, I deliberately opt for the built-in email client, calendar, sticky notes, simple text processors, spreadsheets, eBook reader, and task management applications. For example, my GTD (Getting Things Done) implementation uses Apple Mail, Apple Calendar, and Apple Reminders as the cornerstones of David Allen’s famous productivity framework.
I appreciate integrations between native standalone apps and occasionally extend and connect them with automation courtesy of Apple Shortcuts, as I gravitate towards microservices infrastructures. Selecting only the tools you need when you need them while still having the ability to mature into new components gradually is an intelligent approach that has proven effective. I believe in modularity and integrations for productivity and knowledge management setups. As Cupertino developers add new features and tighten integrations, I spend significant time adopting them to keep everything as organised, integrated, and current as possible. I’ve extracted everything I could from the tools I chose.
Naturally, I’d like to use the native Apple Notes app for my knowledge management and the abovementioned GTD tickler file, but I don’t. The power I require, the sacrifices that must be made, and the high stakes linked to this particular type of data have compelled me to try on several occasions, only to bounce back to tools that work. So, no, this review is not written in Apple Notes. It falls short in many respects; hence, I prefer using Obsidian for knowledge management, DEVONthink for my paperless office, and Scrivener for long-form writing. This setup has been stable for a while but doesn’t mean it’s set in stone. It continuously evolves on a micro level but remains somewhat similar on a macro level.
When the benefits of having another nice-to-have feature are sufficiently low, I stick with what comes out of the box. In other words, I’m mostly okay with “le vin du patron” unless it’s utterly substandard. However, note-taking, writing, and knowledge management are different matters. Like how Apple’s GarageBand and Logic lost the battle against Ableton Live despite numerous attempts to make it work for music-making, I couldn’t fit Apple Notes into the PKM pigeonhole. I still entertain the idea that it will reach the critical mass of requirements, allowing me to make a complete switch. It has happened before, generally when forced by competition or governmental lawsuits. But how long will I have to wait? Does it take a few billion in fines to make the company realise we need plain text export for our notes, much like we need USB C support?
Regardless, the above doesn’t prevent me from exploring the systems that knowledge engineers worldwide use to make Notes work. There are plenty of enthusiasts like me, and I occasionally cherry-pick something valuable for creative workflows.
My wife uses Apple Notes extensively. She currently has over 300 notes and regularly prunes and grooms them, which is commendable. She isn’t a power user who overthinks the setup, so the framework we’re about to discuss might be excessive. Still, she employs rich formatting, interactive lists, links, and, most importantly, intelligent folders that are kept up to date through tags. She says that many professionals who rely on writing use this application extensively. She also adds significant weight to the pro/con balance in favour of or against turning Apple Notes into my main knowledge management vault: Apple Notes is how we share thoughts and collaborate.
This is why I couldn’t skip the preview thumbnail when YouTube’s algorithm, which understands me better than my parents, suggested a video on an Apple Notes-specific note-taking framework called Forever ✱ Notes.
I played around with it, and below is my take on it. If Apple fulfils my wildest dreams, I will happily share them with you and perhaps even update them regularly.
Note: Forever ✱ Notes is a knowledge management system designed for Apple Notes. However, readers outside the Apple ecosystem or those not using the Notes app can still gain inspiration from it. The system incorporates techniques from medium-independent methodologies that can be applied to any note-storing method, allowing connections between them. Therefore, all aspects of the system that are not specific to the macOS/iOS operating systems remain perfectly portable to other note-taking applications. Case in point: Todd Harper uses the framework’s conventions in a different note-taking application, Bear.
The Heavy Asterisk
One of the smartest moves made by
, the system’s creator, was to pay attention to its visual aspect. Perhaps, like many drawn into the Apple ecosystem, he was initially attracted to it because of its visual appeal. He knows how important this is to the other ecosystem members.I’ve always found the notes written in Apple Notes to be particularly unattractive, with little that one can do about it, even if the user is a graphic designer who knows what he’s doing. So, kudos for shared PNG files to spruce up otherwise dull-looking Apple Notes and for creating visual conventions that work in the grand scheme, for understanding the lighting and minimal, distraction-free background design for tutorial videos and the UI of the documentation website that mimics the Apple Notes app itself. These are details. But, as Sherlock Holmes famously said, there’s nothing more crucial than details.
The heavy asterisk resembling the Red Hot Chilli Peppers logo is a distinctive mark of the system that helps it stand out from the crowd. It acts as a leitmotif throughout the framework through signifiers, watermarks, and logos, much like BUJO’s minimalistic lightning bolt and other visual cues. Not only is this a visual Montblanc-esque cue to recognise from afar, but it also carries semantic meaning in the notes. So much so that a documentation page is dedicated to setting up a shortcut. You are expected to use this symbol extensively.
Other systems also use visual cues for at-a-glance reference. Frameworks like Ryder Carroll’s BUJO (Bullet Journal) or Cal Newport’s Corner-Marking Method come to mind, but there are many others. Almost any systematic approach to marginalia and note-taking uses visual conventions. The difference is that here, you don’t have to invent them. In opinionated frameworks, this choice is generally made for you. This is why we chose them in the first place. You can follow conventions verbatim, change them, and extend them with your use case specifics.
In this framework, ✱ marks the most important notes. Since it precedes their titles, you should use the symbol in searches and link management. It is a simple yet powerful idea for a one-trick-pony labelling system. It is simple; therefore, it works. As a bonus, once set up on one device, the keyboard shortcut will be automatically replicated across all iCloud-connected ones.
Note: For Markdown users and those who rely on Markdown text editors to complete their text formatting, **, which is recommended as a shortcut for generating the heavy asterisk, is a specific symbol combination that will mark your text in bold. Therefore, you might choose a different one to avoid Markdown interference.
The system suggests that you prepend the symbol to the following essential sections of your notes vault: home, hubs, journal, and collections. If you maintain other vital folders and evergreen notes, you can also mark them. Matthias’s vault, for example, displays the ✱ Education and ✱ Health notes. Your mileage may vary.
Another bonus is using this symbol to search through Apple Spotlight. It’s one of the easiest ways to get there. However, I wonder how you would ask Siri to open the “heavy asterisk health” note.
I still have much to share about this framework, but let’s take it gradually.
In the next instalment, we’ll examine the four essential pillars of the framework: hubs, links, tags, and signifiers. Despite their somewhat underwhelming names, they pack a lot of power. The kind that will benefit you as a knowledge engineer, whether you are an Apple user or not.
In the meantime, I recommend you go to the system's official website and give
well-deserved love for a massive contribution to the Apple-dominated PKM world.