I've been on the internet for a long time and I've been doing a lot of things. I have dozens of accounts on a bunch of websites, I wrote thousands of posts, I tried all kind of things, failing at some, succeeding at others. I have used different platforms, solve a bunch of problems I had and found tools that I always knew will help me one day.
All this is great. I like how much variety the internet provides me. The problem with so much information, with so many things that were done and need to be done, is that it becomes harder and harder to remember everything, to know what you did at a certain time and how, what tools you used, what passwords you have, and so on.
At times, when I have to redo something I did a few years, or even a few months ago, I feel lost because I cannot remember what steps I followed at the time, or what kind of information helped me. So, instead of being able to redo something I need quickly, I have to start from almost zero.
For example, a few months ago I purchased a plane ticket for when I am done with work and I can go home. The date is getting closer and closer, and as time passed, I began to forget some of the details about the flight. Every time I need a piece of information I have to get on the website, remember my username and password, figure out how the website works and then find whatever I am looking for.
Another example would involve my Covid vaccine, especially the documents that prove that I got it. A few months ago I got sick and needed those documents to prove that I took all the necessary precautions to avoid getting the disease, this way getting paid for the days that I was sick, since for a multitude of reasons I can't currently get a paper from a doctor to justify my absence from work. However, recently the insurance company called my boss saying that they can't really accept my papers because they are from a different country, and so they need to get the details from an app, using a QR code. Luckily for me, I already had an account on the app and website that they wanted, but I just forgot how to use everything or how to even log in because I didn't do it in the last year.
Anyway, these are just some of the most recent examples, but I could keep on going. Having to go back to something I did just to get some quick information or just to solve a quick problem isn't that big of a deal, but it becomes really annoying when I have to spend an extra 15 minutes trying to figure out how to navigate a website that I forgot about, or use an app that I haven't used in years.
So, what I thought would be a good idea is to keep a record of important details that I might need regarding different websites / services, and even instructions that explain how to use certain things or how to solve certain problems that I encountered in the past, that I might not remember much about.
This would make the retrieval of information or problem solving much easier and faster.
Instead of having to get on the website where I bought my plane tickets and log in to check some random details that I constantly forget, I could have a PDF or just a Word document on my PC with all the basic things that I might quickly need at some point, such as the date of departure, time, price, seat placement if there's any, number of things I can take with me and so on.
For the other problem I could simply have a file with information about when I got my vaccine, when it "expires", the name of the apps / websites I need to use in order to easily share that information with others, how to use the platforms, and so on.
Once again, the examples can keep going.
I didn't yet implement this, it's just an idea I very very recently got. This could help me save a lot of time spent trying to get information that I forgot from places I don't remember much about, by just keeping a record of important information. This is basically the equivalent to having all my important documents organized in folders so that I can get what I need quickly without having to spend hours searching for the right paper.