Counting Down to 90 - Week 1545 - More Geeking Out

The Concept Explained

Counting Down to 90 - Week 1579

Why 1579

Bhavin's WritingsBhavin Jankharia

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After last week’s poem on avoidable man-made disasters and then the horrible crash in Ahmedabad, I didn’t really want to write about my thoughts, or indulge in soul-searching. 

Tech is a good fall-back.

Six days ago, I queried both ChatGPT and Claude about a good notes taking software or app that can help me organize my ideas and thoughts related to future posts and help access pdfs and reference material better. I have tried everything from Apple Notes to Obsidian to Evernote to Bear and Craft and I still use some of them for specific purposes, but I can’t seem to find that one, one-stop-shop and future-proof software.

Both told me to try Logseq, which is an open-source software using Markdown, which kind of makes it future-proof. I have been using it now for 5 days and it is able to collect everything in one place and sync across all my devices. You can just dump whatever you want to reference in the future in “today’s” page, making sure you use enough tags to link different blocks together or use a whiteboard to just collect your thoughts and ideas including photos and pdfs.

I use Zotero extensively as my reference manager for the pdfs of the journal articles I read everyday. Logseq is able to add Zotero links which makes it very easy to write a short note and then access the note and the pdf without actually opening Zotero.  

I use Day One to log my daily activities, but Day One is structured differently and does not somehow have the same flexibility that Logseq has. 

Since Google announced the new version of Gemini, I have been using ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity and sometimes DeepSeek for different tasks. ChatGPT still remains the best general purpose AI tool for technical and medical queries and for generating images like the one I have used with this article. Claude however is amazing at report generation. 

In a July 2024 piece titled “From Diagnosis to Dictation to Writing to Searches - How I use AI in 2024”, I mentioned how I use MacWhisper for transcribing dictations. I dictate using the Philips Recorder App on my phone, then AirDrop the file into the workstation, which triggers an automation that automatically opens MacWhisper, which then transcribes the dictation. I used to copy-paste into the report template and then format the report, but it was always difficult and tedious to do this with structured templates. 

I tried some prompts two weeks ago with ChatGPT and Claude, asking them to format the transcribed words into specific templates while correcting grammar, spelling, etc and then displaying the output in Verdana 12, which is the font I use for the reports. Claude does an amazing job and then all you have to do is copy paste the output straight into your report, which saves me at least 1-2 minutes per report.

I use Scrivener for my general writing. It helps organize the pieces into folders and chapters, but for a few months earlier this year, I experimented with Lex.ai. The problem with all AI based writing softwares is that while they may eventually be able to write like you if you tell them what the writing should be about, the tone is never correct. Perhaps you as a reader may not be able to tell, but each time it rewrote a paragraph, it always felt off. Now I use AI only for research, but not to write. 

And then of course, there is Slack for communication within the practice, Twist for threaded, per-patient conversations and ToDoist for daily tasks.

Sometimes it is simple tweaks that save time. Creating desktop apps for Google Calendar and a couple of banking sites via Safari or Chrome speeds up access. The dual screen helps, because it speeds up the ability to use different softwares at the same time without using Cmd-Tab.  

I think the growth of AI is also spurring a growth in software innovation and anything that makes life easier is worth the effort. While each of these apps or innovations may individually just help save me a minute here or there, it adds up to around 30-60 minutes saved by the time the day is done…which is a lot.