Primer

A primer is a concise, entry‑level document that explains the fundamentals of a subject, often serving as a first point of contact before deeper resources like textbooks, handbooks, or technical standards. It prioritizes clarity over completeness and orients readers to key ideas, terms, and why the topic matters.

I use primers whenever I want to look into a new topic or when I want to get a fresh overview of a topic I’ve been dealing with for a long time. The goal is to get a comprehensive view and be able to link to it whenever I refer to a topic in another note or want to provide a quick introduction to someone.

I create these primers in Obsidian using Claude Code, which connects to my knowledge graph and uses Perplexity for web research.