What are categories?
When you work with a collection
that includes material belonging to different subjects, you will probably want to keep
different subjects in different sections of the knowledge
tree (in the contents window). You will probably
also often want to design your items differently for questions
in literature and differently for questions related to the math. For example, you will use
picture to illustrate your anatomy branch, sounds to illustrate your foreign language
section, spell-pads to make your spelling section more effective, etc.
To help you keep different subjects in one collection,
SuperMemo introduces the concept of a category. A category is
a section of the knowledge tree in the contents window. It is used for keeping material related
to a single subject. Elements added to a given category may
use their own template that determines their look (e.g.
images, sounds, colors, fonts, sizes of text fields, number of shape components, etc.
Creating a category
You can easily create a new category using the following
steps:
- go to the contents window
(e.g. by clicking Contents)
- click any element (this element will be used to build the
category and will be the ancestor or all category elements)
- press Ctrl+K (Category : Make category
on the content's pop-up menu). SuperMemo will ask you for the
name of the category. Type the name, e.g. biology, geography, etc. If your Tools
toolbar is visible, you will see in the category combo-box that your new category
becomes the default category. This means that by choosing Add new, you
will add new elements to this category
- press Ctrl+A if you want to add some elements to
your new category. If you choose Contents, you will see your newly added
elements become children of the main category element (the one chosen in Step 2)
- if you define a new look for your category elements, you can
press Alt+Ctrl+s to save the look as the default template for the current
category (Template : Save as default on the element
pop-up menu)
Properties of a category
If you would like to edit categories, you can choose Search
: Categories on the main menu. You will see the category registry with all
categories that you have defined until now:
Each category in the registry is characterized by the
following attributes (compare with the picture above):
- name - the name of the category (e.g. Geography).
All category names are displayed on the left in the category registry
- template - template that
determines the look of elements in the category
- root - the element which
is the ancestor of all elements included in the category (i.e. all elements in the
category are descendants of the root). This is the same
element that you have chosen in Step 2 above when creating a category
- hook - the element to which new category elements are
added as children when you choose Add new (e.g.
by pressing Ctrl+A). This element is chosen
automatically by SuperMemo and you do not have to change it. Hook is either equal the root
(esp. initially) or is a descendant of the root. Note that Add new adds
elements to the hook of the current category (as selected in the category combo box on the
Tools toolbar). Once the number of children in a given hook exceeds a
defined limit, a new hook node is chosen automatically by SuperMemo
- ordinal - default ordinal in the category
- forgetting index - default value of the
requested forgetting index in the category
- auto-merge - parameter which determines if Merge
with template is to be applied automatically on elements transferred from another
category to the category in question
- topic template - template used for topics
in the category
- task template - template used for tasks in
the category
Using category registry
The category registry can be opened with Search :
Categories on the main menu. Category registry is useful in the following
circumstances:
- If you want to change the name of a category, use Rename
in the category registry
- If you want to change the template used for items in the
category, click the Template button in the category registry, select a
new template from the template registry and choose Accept
- To delete a category, choose Delete in the
category registry
It is not recommended to change Root or Hook
manually (unless you fully understand the way SuperMemo builds category folders under the
category root)
Summary
Here is the typical way of working with categories:
- Select a branch in the contents window (this branch will became the root and the
first hook of the newly created category)
- Press Ctrl+K (Category : Make category
on the content's pop-up menu)
- Use Search : Categories to change the
default category template
- To change the current category (e.g. to start working with Chemistry
after finishing work with Geography), choose the new category in the
category combo-box on the Tools toolbar
Once you understand the concept of the category, it will
become very easy to manage a large number of items belonging to entirely different areas
of knowledge
Frequently Asked Questions
To use a category template
with Add new you need to first select the appropriate category