medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
If Frans ever does decide to go into business, I can strongly recommend his carpentry
skills - I´m sure the stand he describes is terrific!
Meg
-----Original Message-----
From: medieval-religion - Scholarly discussions of medieval religious culture [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Frans van Liere
Sent: Saturday, April 26, 2008 10:52 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [M-R] Organizing Files
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Dear all,
I thought the original question was: how do you keep track of your files while you are writing?
I have a number of reading stands on my desk that look a bit like the old-fashioned reading stands you got in the Bodleian Library, before they started using the foam cushions there. I made them from recycled pallets (which in the US are often made of nice oak boards). (The design is so popular with friends that I have considered giving up my academic career and start a business in making these.) The ideal, I found, would be to have a two-sided reading stand that swivels, so I can have various books and notes open at the same time while I am writing. I once saw a nifty construction like this on an image of Christine De Pizan in her study (I think it's on the cover of the Penguin translation), and I've been wanting to build one ever since.
Color-coded post-it notes are very helpful, too. The only problem is that they fade in the sunlight very quickly.
But the discussion seems to have broadened to: how do you keep track of your files, electronic or in xerox form, full stop. May I be so bold as to suggest using NotaBene (www.notabene.com)? This program has a nifty system to take notes, store and retrieve them, combined with a bibliography, all intregrated into its word processing program. I simply cannot imagine any scholar in the humanities not using it. (Sorry for the commercial pitch, but I assure you I am not getting paid for this.)
Frans van Liere
Department of History, Calvin College
1845 Knollcrest Circle SE
Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/history/faculty/vanlieref/
>>> "Cormack, Margaret Jean" <[log in to unmask]> 04/25/08 4:44 PM >>>
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Dear Christopher,
But then you have to organize your CDs and/or hard drive,
which is just as bad as when the stuff is on paper!
Meg
-----Original Message-----
From: medieval-religion - Scholarly discussions of medieval religious
culture [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Christopher Crockett
Sent: Friday, April 25, 2008 3:54 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [M-R] Organizing Files
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
culture
From: Diana Wright <[log in to unmask]>
> This question is for the rest of you who are NOT librarians. How do
you
organize your files -- notes, offprints, photocopies, notebooks, etc.
"[handwritten] notes, offprints, photocopies, notebooks"
how Quaint.
> -- & still keep things handy while you are writing? I think I have
reached some kind of tipping point.
well, some of us are too Kind to have mentioned it...
> My ideal space would have a couple of very long, parallel tables for
stacking & spreading, but I am pretty well limited to a small desk in a
small bedroom for the files and papers, although books are allowed all
over the house. [It was quite a struggle, though, to get them out of the
bathroom closet, but after a good pout they settled onto the staircase.]
The
issue here is all the non-book stuff.
i seem to be heading in a "non-book stuff" direction, even when i use
books to
extract the information.
lately i've been doing a *lot* of OCRing, from books, periodicals, off
The
Innernets (esp. JSTOR), ending up with WORD files which i can put on my
USB
drives to haul home from the lieberry, put on my HD at home, eventually
on
CDs.
also, downloading a lot of older stuff as .pdfs from Gallica,
books.google,
wherever, putting those together, topically arranged, onto CDs --i've
got
quite a library of CDs now, including long runs of basic [French]
periodicals,
etc.
shucks, i can't remember when i last wrote a "note" --sometime away back
in
the last millennium, it seems like.
Abby FineReader is the best OCR program i've found and, with a fast
machine
(which i have at taxpayers' expense), works pretty... well, fast.
with *really* clean images of really standard fonts (i.e., from JSTOR),
pasting directly into WORD works pretty well.
even the crappy, low (or no) rez images of 19th c. stuff off of Gallica
can be
downloaded in .tff format and run through FineReader with a more or less
legible result --i only do a real Clean Up if i'm going to use it in
something
i'm writing.
it's just *so* much easier when quoting extensive sections of text --or
doing
rough drafts using long bits which will eventually be cut out of the
final
version-- to have all that text in digital form rather than keystroaking
from
a Hard Copy.
and, it's convenient to get to, as well.
not as though i've got to find it stacked on some table or in a bathroom
closet...
c
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