Capture and Highlight Flow

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E-books are my dream. My highlights in e-books and Raindrop bookmarks sync to Readwise which syncs to Obsidian which syncs to DEVONthink, Ulysses, and an AI assistant. Such a nice way to keep a commonplace book.

Readwise – “Get the most out of what you read. Readwise makes it easy to revisit and learn from your ebook & article highlights.”
Raindrop.io — All-in-one bookmark manager – “Intuitive. Powerful. Runs everywhere.”
Obsidian – Sharpen your thinking – “Obsidian is the private and flexible writing app that adapts to the way you think.”
DEVONtechnologies | DEVONthink, professional document and information management for the Mac and iOS – “Focus on your work and let DEVONthink remember all the details. Collect, organize, edit and annotate documents of any kind. Have them automatically analyzed, connected, and filed.”
Ulysses – “Powerful features and a pleasant, focused writing experience combined in one tool, made for people who love to write and write a lot — this is Ulysses.”
Elephas – Personal AI Writing Assistant for Mac – “ChatGPT for your entire knowledge base.”

When I highlight text in any of my Kindle readers, that text is synced to Readwise. Readwise can then sync and export those highlights to a number of destinations, including Obsidian. Obsidian saves my highlights as Markdown files to my laptop’s hard drive. DEVONthink, my favorite document manager, indexes the Obsidian folders to feed the highlights into its search and analysis tools. Ulysses, my favorite text editor, also indexes the Obsidian folders, making them available within the editor.

Here’s how all of that looks in action. This is a screenshot of the Ulysses writing app showing highlights from “I Shall Wear Midnight” by Terry Pratchett. I highlight text in the Kindle reader, and those highlights automatically end up in my editor ready to use.

Screenshot of the Ulysses writing app showing quotes from “I Shall Wear Midnight” by Terry Pratchett.

Related resources from our glossary.

Here are some articles from others on how to use these tools.