LaTeX for notes

I finally ran out of daily planned pages in my notebook from the last print that I did. I made the template using AutoCAD because it was the tool that I had on my computer that I knew how to use at the time.

This time however, I decided to make a change. I have been working for the last few years to remove all sources of Lock-In from my workflows, anything that could cause me to have to pay more, or force me down a path that I don't want to because the entity holding the tool changed what they want to do.

The fact that I don't own my current version of AutoCAD is a huge red flag. If they go full bad, and I mean more bad, then I won't be able to use the existing software that I have paid a lot of money for, every year, at all.

So I decided to build a quick alternative using LaTeX.

Using LaTeX

It took me about an hour to figure out exactly what I wanted to do, and there are still a few things that I need to work on to make it exactly what I'm looking for, but its great for a V0.

The page has three sections:

My schedule for the day
Date, and tasks for the day
Any notes that come up during the day.

By writing in my schedule it helps me remember what I need to prepare for on a daily basis. I fill it in the day before, typically after supper, and fill it up with the stuff that I know I have to get done.

If there are more notes I add a blank page after this on.

Take a look

If you want to give this a try yourself, the Tex file is here, or you can grab the pdf page here

What's missing?

I want to clean it up a little, change the fontsize, and add a couple unicode characters, like a ⬜ for the tasks. Checking off a completed task is always satisfying.

It also needs some colour. I bought a colour laser printer, Brother of course, last year and using it ot make blue lines, and pink or red boxes is something that would make it a lot nicer, rather than sticking with only black and white. It would also make it cleaner when I want to stick with pencil vs blue pen.

EDIT

I have already updated the general page. The lines are now blue, and I added a second blank page for notes. I still haven't figured out how to use a unicode value for the tasks, but for now I will just make my own box to check. You can download the pdf here

:wq