2023-07-07

Excited to encounter another PKM beast: Tana

Since I have no prior experience with Roam and Notion, Tana takes getting used to. But Ev at the end did a great job introducing it.

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Tana

#PKM

Hello, Tana!

(2023-08-07) Just got early access to Tana. My first impressions:

  • Slick UI design
  • Quick response
  • In-context guide

Having played with Logseq, Tana's design philosophy is now very clear. I am on my way to try implementing my glossary/terminology management/lookup system.

Logseq's live query sucks. In comparison, from the way it looks, Tana's gonna rock in that department.

At a glance

  • Unified design: everything is a node
  • AirTable + Notion + Roam
  • An outlining app rather than writing app like Obsidian
  • Supertags
  • Cloud
  • $10/month or $100 a year
  • Still in beta, not a full publicly available commercial product
  • Norwegian

Pros

Enforces structured/semantic data

AI integration

Cons

Tana's web publishing works only through "workspace." Too much remains to be seen. I won't give up the current free and working Obsidian publishing solution for something this unknown.

#Glasp

Which Is The Best? Tana or Obsidian?

Metadata

  • Title: Which Is The Best? Tana or Obsidian?
  • Tags: #Tana, #Obsidian, #web-publishing
  • URL: https://medium.com/talkingtech/which-is-the-best-tana-or-obsidian-4c15b1e1585d

Highlights & Notes

  • Publish to web I’ve shared my digital garden online using Obsidian almost since the beginning. At first, I used Obsidian Publish and then started to experiment with different options, finally settling on the Digital Garden plugin. I deleted my WordPress website and replaced it with my digital garden. It’s easy to update, even on my iPhone, a cinch to add new content and lends itself to writing. Tana has an option to publish a workspace. I think this is to facilitate sharing templates at the moment rather than a full blown publication solution.

Stian Horklev

#people

Video: Intro of Tana straight from the horse's mouth: Stian Horklev

src: 回到Axton

  • Notes
    • Notion, AirTable
    • Backlinks
    • Outliner
    • Nodes (hierarchical)
    • Semantic structure through Supertags
      • Define something however you like
    • Tana templates (a bunch of fields)
      • Like creating applets or databases for anything
      • Sharable
    • Long ways to go to improve UI
    • AI
      • AI field
        e.g. AI-suggested action items based on YOUR content
        e.g. AI giving you critique of a plan
      • System of commands ("Tana Commands")
    • Command nodes
      • Ask AI
      • API
        • Webhooks
          • Whatsapp
          • Telegram
        • Automation / handshakes with other apps
    • Ecosystem (long-term goal)
      • Integration
      • Plugins
      • API
    • Input API
      • e.g. let GPT do some magic/coding for you, given sample data, like airline itineraries
      • AI for app builders
        • LangChain
    • Onboarding is a challenge for new users not familiar with workflows
    • Likely freemium model
    • AI is expensive

Tana Paste

Markdown-like input text into Tana structures.

Ev Chapman

#people

  • #videoNote
    • Block-based Outliner like Roam + database/structured data like Notion
    • Demo node: "idea for a long-form article"
      • Supertag
      • "Opening" a node = expand the bullet point
        • Reveals some fields like "status," "type." Are they built-in or user-defined?
      • Add a tag ("#spark idea")
        • Configure the tag (e.g. "#spark idea")
        • Here, "status" and "type" are shown as the first two fields, suggesting they are user-defined.
        • Define "default content"
          • e.g. "Brain dump" : a child node!
        • Define each field
          • type
      • Add another tag (e.g. "#YouTube video")
        • It gets its own default content: "YouTube script" node
          • Can have children nodes, further defining the "YouTube script" parent node
        • The fields of this tag can have the same name, e.g. "type"
          • Can identify/pick the same "type" field as used in "#spark idea"
    • Live searches
      • Construct a query (with auto-complete help), which can be named
        • Generates a list of nodes
        • Different views (e.g. table)
        • Can be filtered (through field values)
        • Her "Content Hub," mentioned by Note Aloud (Nicola Fisher) as inspiring, is an example of a named live search.
    • Foreshadows future introduction of Tana "workflows"

!600

In 8 minutes' short video, E did a wonderful job getting me sold on Tana's main feature: Notion-like semantic structure.

CortexFutura

#people

  • #videoNote
    • A node's bullet point with gray outer circle means it's collapsed.
      • Exactly like Logseq (or Workflowy)
    • Quick keyboard shortcuts to go up or down the indentation tree of nodes
    • Root node
      • Automatically contains
        • Calendar
        • Todo
        • Everything else (nodes)
    • Command prompt: CMD+K
      • Can sort nodes
    • TanaLab
      • Regex search
    • CMD+E for quick add to daily node
  • #videoNote
    • Two ways of referencing:
      • At the beginning of a node, use @ sign to create "backlink" or "reference node"; it is identified by dotted line outline of the bullet point.
      • It works like embedding in Obsidian
        • But can be edited directly.
      • Inline reference: use also the @ sign. Shows as a link (underline). Click on it to visit the node.
        • If the referenced node hasn't been created, you'll be prompted to create it, and it goes under the Library node (child of root).
        • SHIFT-click will embed it below the node.
    • MOVE TO command, 3 destinations
      - Home
      - Library
      - Today
    • Backlinks are shown at the end of a node, the "referenced in" section.
    • Views
      • as table
      • as list
      • as cards
      • as columns
      • as tabs
  • #videoNote
    • Think of a tag as a relationship.
      • e.g. "Washington: A Life" is a book. Give it a tag named "book". Here, the relationship is: "is a book."
    • Indent under a node with a tag (tab), then type ">" (greater than) to create a field under the tag.
      • e.g. "Author"
        • Any previously created field names will be shown as prompt (auto-complete) when creating a field in the future.
        • Notice how a tag can be created for the value of this "Author" field (the value is the name of the author).
          • This Author tag seems to serve a different function than the Author field.
            • Duh! The Author tag is a supertag, a template. The Author field is very insignificant.
              • Appreciate the subtlety!
    • CMD-K: configure a field
      • name
      • description
      • field type
        • Anything (freeform data)
        • Instance of an existing tag (shown as #instance)
          • This is great convenience. Will remind you to add a tag in the future for the same field name.
    • Can use mouse to select multiple consecutive nodes and apply bulk change
      • e.g. add a tag
    • Tags can contain spaces
      • e.g. "US President"
    • Can tag a linked new node.
      • @ to create the link
      • Use arrow key to select the link (shows a thin blue outline)
      • CMD-K to add a tag to it.
        • The tag won't show on current page, but it is added to the linked node:
  • OLDER video notes
    • CTRL-I to add a description to any node
    • Fields
      • Field types
      • Default tags
    • Tags
    • @ to reference a node
      • Typed backlinks: powerful concept
    • Views
      • Table view
        • Add a new field to the view
          • e.g. "Topic"
            • Value "US Presidents" itself is also a node

Santi Younger

#people
Video: Interviewing Riccardo Busetti

  • Notes
    • Cloud/sync
      • Not necessarily bad if secure
      • Pro: accessible everywhere with Internet
    • Tana has made Notion/Roam/Logseq obsolete
    • Can Tana replace Obsidian?
      • Yes if it decides to expand the node for long-form writing
    • Lacking Heptabase visuals
      • Can be built too
    • SRS: go with Anki or Mochi
    • Craft for long-form writing
      • Sharable
      • Aesthetic
    • Notion is strong with sharing/creating website
      • Santi did this but moved to Webflow, more powerful, more options

Fred Jame

#people
#paste/b
src

這兩天花最多時間做的事是深入玩Tana和AI功能的整合。雖然還不是很完整，但Tana的資料使用彈性和AI整合深度大概贏Notion有5個馬身。

但如果這些功能用不到，只是單純的做筆記，兩者的差異就沒那麼大，甚至Notion還簡單一點（會說Notion「簡單一點」，就知道Tana有多強）。

但Tana的弱點在於：

  1. 資料的展現方式（字體變化、排版等等）遠不如Notion

  2. 缺乏與外部資料（行事曆、通訊錄、其他SaaS等）的連結整合

  3. 資料很難變成共通格式（PDF之類）跟其他軟體共享、或用於列印

  4. 用於收集資料（錄音、照相、辨識文字）的手機版Tana Capture工具很好用，錄到的聲音可以在網頁版上轉成正確度相當高的文字檔（中文也可以），但目前還沒有行動app，只能用在行動裝置上很難用的網頁版。