Philosophy
Before we go any further it’s worth reinforcing the philosophy behind all of this. Because the numbers look cool, but … what was the point again?
This is all a waste of time if it doesn’t help you find things quicker, more reliably, and with less stress than you can today.
Nothing else matters.
On the forum people often want to tweak the way they use their Johnny.Decimal setup. I don’t mind: use this as a guide and adapt it as you please.
But my core advice is always the same: do whatever you need to do so that you can find your stuff again.
Why the 10 folders thing is important
We’ve all seen shared drives that look something like this. I’ve seen systems with dozens of folders at the top level.
Anything could be anywhere! And it doesn’t get better the deeper you go, it’s chaos all the way down.
There is no chance of you finding anything in a system like this, and every chance that the thing you do eventually find isn’t the correct or only copy.
Johnny.Decimal limits your choices
When you encounter a Johnny.Decimal system — even one you’ve never seen before — you are presented with, at most, ten choices: the areas that have been defined.
10-19Finance and accounts
20-29Products
30-39...and so on
Assuming your areas have been named sensibly, this makes it almost impossible to choose the wrong path. This applies whether you’re opening or saving a file.
And when you go a level deeper, you’re still limited to ten things: your categories.
10-19Finance and accounts
11 Budget
12 Expenses
13 Accounts
20-29Products
21 Drawings
22 Photography
30-39...and so on
These limitations help you to be sure that you’re looking in the right place, and that you’re not looking in the wrong place.
We can further improve discoverability by using an index, which we talk about on the next page.
A little friction can be a good thing
When you don’t use numbers, it’s easy to create a new folder. You just … create one.
At the area and category level, it shouldn’t be that easy. Creating a new category should be something that you consider at least momentarily.
Giving them numbers, and limiting your availability to 10, forces you in to this moment of consideration.
Once you’re down at your ID level, it doesn’t matter so much. You’re in a category. You are, by my definition, organised. Create away.
Setup time is repaid later
Setting this up is certainly not free from a time perspective. You need to plan and maintain your system. It doesn’t manage itself.
But this time that you spend is paid back many times over by the reduction in friction every time you go to open or save a file.