To optimize search performance:

• Use boxes with drawers that can be pulled open. (2:1)

• The drawers can be pulled out for a search operated on the chair. (2:4)

• Use normal paper instead of card stock to reduce weight for a search on the chair (2:5). For the same reason, use wooden boxes instead of metal boxes (2:1).

  Plastic boxes are lighter but were not common at the time of Luhmann.

  Technically, only the drawers need to be wooden, but boxes with a metal body and wooden drawers are uncommon.

  I also have seen some people using clipboard boxes.

• Only use one side of a piece of paper in octavo format (half letter-size) so reading it during a search does not require taking it out. (2:2)

  Half letter-size allows the whole paper to be skimmed at a glance. This is curcial for seeking possibilities for linking 0b1 when searching for a slip.

  Also, it allows pulling out "any number of Zettel and arrange them" on the desk. Sascha2020

  Potentially I can use the back side for something not needed to read during a search:

    - Verbatim blockquotes from the source, in case my future writing needs them for both citation and verifying my rephrasing.
  
    - A list of backlinks. [[0c1]]
  
    - URLs for reference.
  

• Make the slip number easily visible, e.g. "on the left of the first line" of the slip. (2:12) or as the file name in a digital slip box.

• Maintain a register of keywords and bibliographical information. 0c2

• Use hubs 0c3 to list Zettels. Sascha2016

¹The technical requirements of slip boxes involve wooden boxes, which have drawers that can be pulled open, and pieces of paper in octavo format (about half of a letter-size sheet). ²We should only write on one side of these papers so that in searching through them, we do not have to take out a paper in order to read it. ³This doubles the space, but not entirely (since we would not write on both sides of all the slips). ⁴This consideration is not unimportant as the arrangement of boxes can, after some decades, become so large that it cannot be easily be used from one’s chair. ⁵In order to counteract this tendency, I recommend taking normal paper and not card stock.

-- Luhmann1992 Section II

keywords: #search-optimization