Good notes are built from clearly scoped units. An atomic note captures one idea rather than mixing several unrelated ones, which makes it easy to link, reuse, and later turn into a flashcard. The opposite mistake is writing long notes where the useful idea is buried inside paragraphs of context; this hides the insight and makes linking awkward. Asking three guiding questions helps shape an atomic note well: what problem is this solving, what trade-off does it create, and how will I know it worked. The same principle scales up to permanent notes, which are self-contained entries written in your own words that capture one durable idea and are designed to link into a wider network.
The Zettelkasten method formalizes this approach around atomic ideas, unique identifiers, and explicit connections that help generate new thinking over time. Daily notes provide a complementary low-friction timeline, capturing work, thoughts, and observations for a specific date so the system always has a place to write. Daily notes can become an unprocessed dumping ground, so the discipline is to convert their contents into evergreen notes, refined entries that express durable insights clearly. Evergreen notes are improved over time until they stand on their own, and because they compound across months or years they form the long-term payoff of a well-run system. Progressive summarization supports this evolution by gradually highlighting, summarizing, and refining a note so the most important ideas rise to the surface and become easy to find later.