"You don't need to memorise everything you need, but rather make sure you know how to find it quickly". This is what our professors and mentors used to say at my "alma mater", the best engineering school in the Soviet Union. This struck me immensely at the beginning, because all my school years everybody kept telling me that learning everything by rote is an essential part of being an educated person. But during the first terms at university I quickly changed my mind around it. Even though knowing by heart is a very useful exercise for the mind and a brilliant way to impress girls reciting Brodsky lyrics, in engineering it simply doesn't scale.

Working on a project you habitually have to go over a variety of catalogues, books of classic mechanics or electronics, maybe even classic physics, hundreds of websites and years of your own notes. There are a few extraordinary people who can memorise this all, however the majority of us do not possess such skill. But even a genius would have to learn more and more everyday, because every next project requires different knowledge. The world changes at a great rate and it is quite demanding to keep up with it. The old advice on learning everything you need and keeping good notes to refresh your memory is relevant as never before.

The main advice was to keep notes on anything you read. Brief summary with strict references to the original material would help you to memorise the structure of the information and will help you to refresh the memory should you need it. That was called a “conspectus” and traditionally it was a notebook with handwriting and drawings in it. It is quite a personal reference and makes a poor source of information for other people, because it is based on the existing background of the author. Yet for the author it is more valuable than the original source.

These days the "conspectus" approach is adopted for new needs and sources of information. We keep everything in the clouds, encrypted and backed up to eliminate any risk of losing it or leaking. Even sources changed significantly: catalogues are websites or special software, books are digitised. Browsing the latest articles on the web you store the links to “pocket”, reading books on tablet PC you highlight essentials and preserve them for future use. And the same we do for youtube videos, useful tweets, reddit articles, facebook posts, even reading the hardcopy of a magazine I take a picture of some important places to get back to it later if needed. The digital revolution empowered us with effectively infinite memory. Because having your notes around and being able to navigate quickly in the gigantic amount of information matters as much as remembering it in practical terms. This is an incredible advantage.

The advice of my mentors is more valuable than ever before. Focus on making information in front of you useful for the “future you” by making it easily available, rather than “downloading” everything to your brain. Read, watch, listen and keep notes, making sure you get it at once should you need it.

I hope you find it useful. If you have questions or disagree with me please let me know, I’m always happy to know more.

I hope you have a great day!