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Make notes, in private and in public.
I have a private "notes" repo on GitHub where I keep notes in the issues (the repo itself is empty). Any time I'm trying out a new piece of software I open an issue there, then add notes on the issue comments as I figure things out.
I use GitHub issues because they have excellent backups and they show up on GitHub search - plus there's a really good API which I use to periodically export and backup my note elsewhere.
If something fits. I'll turn my notes into a TIL and publish them on https://til.simonwillison.net - that site uses the markdown format as GitHub issues, so publishing a TIL that started out as an issue comment only takes me a few minutes.
A set of three foot pedals: one for screen recordings, another for instant replay, and another for quick voice notes.
Usage: mash the leftmost pedal to toggle recording the screen; mash the middle pedal to save off the past 30 seconds of my activity (usually along with me verbally narrating what I'm doing, an oddball habit that has paid dividends thanks to this config) and finally, push-to-talk (drops an .mp3 in the appropriate folder; I usually just have it work the same as the leftmost pedal (i.e. saving an .mkv which just so happens to have user audio) because I'm too lazy to bash-script ffmpeg and OBS is already open.
Hardware: I have a tri-pedal set, made by the same manufacturer documented in the 'Vim Clutch' article here on HN (I'm too lazy to go find the URL but it will come up easily in a search.) The pedals are mapped to shortcuts in OBS for the functions described above.
Software: OBS Studio, Gnome desktop (NixOS), and Input Remapper. (More on this last one further down.)
Caveat: This currently only works under Xorg (not Wayland) because Wayland doesn't let OBS grab shortcuts outside its own window (Wayland is such a Karen.) There's a workaround that I'm working on, but it involves an OBS plugin called obs-websocket and a straightforward bit of Python scripting that I have nonetheless yet to finish, as well as Input Remapper (https://github.com/sezanzeb/input-remapper) so Xorg it is for now.
For bonus points, I made the destination folder the 'attachments' folder in my Obsidian vault. Then I can index them by subject, a task that is surprisingly entertaining, as links from topic pages in Obsidian.
Honestly. I don't remember how I thought before. This is the perfect thinking machine.