Starting to transfer to a spreadsheet instead of my usual paper notebook I list all my electronics in to get a grasp on all my parts (towers, laptops, memory, motherboards, videocards, etc). Lately I’ve been on a kick of labeling all my shelves (medicine, linen, kitchenware) and trying to sort things into random plastic bins I’ve had laying around waiting for a purpose.
I realize I could dive into deep rabbit holes for every category. With electronics I’m thinking of documenting every chip, board, and component along with compatibilities. Pantries and personal goods could be inventoried and auto-reordered, better tracking of my tools and materials with service reminders for equipment, etc etc.
I’ve gone through years where I throw everything away and get rid of anything not used recently and years where I horde everything and anything. Seems moderation in both is key and why keeping it all in mind and documented seems like the right thing to do if you have the time to kill.
tldr, what tips or tricks do you use to keep up with all your shit?
Is this something people do? I thought I was accidentally on some niche hobby community but I think this is aimed at a general audience.
What kinds of things do you inventory? Everything? Electronics? Furniture? You mentioned pantry?
I hope I don’t come off condescending I’m genuinely confused rn.
Everything I’d want replaced by my insurance goes in a LibreOffice spreadsheet.
Never needed to file a claim using it, but it doubles as the place where I record warranty expiration dates, which has come in handy a few times.
It’s also been useful when buying replacements to see how much I paid in the past.
Oh, insurance. That’s a pretty good reason to do this. hmmm
I just do visual inventory for pantry, like there’s a canned meal shelf which has assorted soups or single serve preserved stuff. Same with canned sides (like corn, green beans etc), once a section gets low I just pick a few up to restock it. Used to do pick-up and was useful because I could just walk to the pantry with a tablet and use an app to fill it up. Trying to get away from the whole app-pickup system though. Also have a white board next to the fridge with a constant list we add onto, eventually want to switch that over to a list app so I’m not having to take a picture of it or writing it down to get the things I need at the store.
If you have a deep pantry, inventory is necessary
What in the OCD is this? /s
No, but seriously, I use only a spreadsheet for the things I need to track. Is there a proper small scale database solution?
Is there a proper small scale database solution?
Spreadsheets in the office suite of your choice
Most people don’t do that. They just have general places to keep track of important things. Most people are far less organised than you.
Some people on here are saying you come across as mentally ill in some way, but I don’t think that’s necessarily true. I would hope you naturally find some sense of joy or fulfillment in keeping track of different types of databases for minor practical benefits. I’m no psychologist though.
I think this is a good question for a therapist. I mean no disrespect. Feeling the need to label shelves with the things on them sounds like a compulsion. As does oscillating between hoarding and purging and several other things you said. A therapist can help you manage these desires and keep you out of the rabbit holes.
Holy crud, that’s a new hot take. Changes that occur over decades and because of different living conditions doesn’t account to “oscillating” if you actually read my comments. Also, you’ve apparently never lived with multiple people and a large pantry, this is just basic organization like a linen closet your grandparents had. You didn’t have to label them in the past because usually a singular person was in charge of placing everything (never heard of the husband trope that can’t find anything?).
The difference between what I would “imagine” a good organizational setup to be versus what I’m willing to actually do is a huge gap. If you had any clue about my actual life the compulsion comment would be rather hilarious. I would suggest not looking at a few internet comments and immediately telling someone to seek therapy with an arm-chair diagnosis you’ve deemed responsible, that in itself seems like an unhealthy disorder.
Personally I’ve been trending the opposite direction: getting rid of things. We had our first kid about 7 years ago, which has seriously decreased my time for tinkering. I didn’t realize it at first, so I kept on picking up projects that interested me, got some pieces for them, organized them, and… they’re still there years later. The worst a somewhat sentimental things, that don’t really see much use, and are also projects. For example, I bought the boom box of my youth. It’s from the 80s (it wasn’t new when I had it 25 years ago) and needs some TCL - potentiometers cleaned up, some loose connections run down, etc. It’s low on my list of things to fix because it doesn’t actually sound that great and cant compete with my Bluetooth speaker.
I was at your stage a little over 10 years ago, renting and moving, kids slowly getting more things. Now they’re starting to move out and I’ve purchased a larger run down house that needs to be filled up. There’s some things I regret getting rid of like materials but for the most part I’m happy I don’t have so much to keep track of at the moment. The projects I’ve shelved for some many years are starting to get dusted off again and I’m finally getting back into hobbies and tinkering again. Definitely a good observation on the bluetooth speaker, there’s some things it’s just not worth putting the effort into unless it’s a niche need like a portable cassette player etc. I’m hoping you experience the same thing and get some of that time back in your future to do what you want.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply! I am holding on to some things in hopes of being able to do with the kids when they’re older, but it has been pretty liberating getting rid of some of this stuff.
I limit myself to what is known as a Field Replaceable Unit (FRU)
I don’t need to know the chips on the circuit board as I am not skilled enough to replace them.
I have tracked the model and part number of each of mine and my wifes PC parts but honestly, if my 3070 throws a wobbly, i am not going to start swapping memory units or capacitors on it.
The only thing I have inventoried is what’s in the attic. Everything is in large plastic totes by category. I keep a text file listing each tote and what’s in each. You looking for something specific? Search for that word in the text file and then go open up tote F3.
The totes are color coded based on what category of item is in them & have their contents written on the lids using a chalkboard marker for anyone in the family who doesn’t want to use the text file.
I’ve got a Shulker farm, so I’m set for space. The trouble is that even after recursively duplicating trillions upon trillions of pens, I still can’t ever find one when I actually need it.
I don’t have such an inventory, but I’d definitely use Notion like I do for everything else (basically)
I used to track everything. Now I just keep stuff in regions of my room and know basically where to look. At the same time, I have nearly floor to ceiling drawer cabinets in my room, a closet full of shelves, and a raised bed I made to allow full size plastic totes to fit under. My electronics station is integrated into my bed with a swivel laptop stand that can work in bed or at my desk. For components, everything is organized by
E95E24 log scale with the like number values consolidated. So like one drawer/container might have 0.47, 4.7, 47, 470, 4k7, 47k, 470k, and 4m7.Could you delve a little more into detail on that numbering system?
Sorry, corrected my mistaken memory. I use E24 log values for organization, AKA 5% values.
Left is surface mount resistors, middle is all of my through hole spare caps and resistors, right are my surface mount capacitors. The numbers are the E24 series. Anything that I have that is an in between value gets into the rounded down value, and I split up the 10’s as shown:
Nice! Thank you for that!
Spreadsheets are for math. You want a database, specifically an asset management database. Snipe-it for example.
Meh, spreadsheets are for whatever you use them for. I use them for a lighter version of project management, where I don’t need all the rules of a project management app because they get in the way.
Thank you for the common sense response, it hadn’t clicked but I think this was my problem. The format of the spreadsheet and trying to make it work for my purposes just made me stop everytime I attempted it. This identified my problem I believe and now I can look into other options. As other’s have said, I probably could get it to work for my purposes but learning and understanding all the tools with the program just isn’t worth it for this one singular reason.
I get rid of what I don’t want or haven’t used in years. No need to track anything.
I haven’t looked into it for personal use but I’ve heard of using self hosted inventory management software and actually scanning the product’s barcode and tracking the items however the system handles it. no idea of the actual features, like I said I haven’t tried it.
I am Professor Chaos!
