cram-notes

name

cram-notes

description

Condense exhaustive university lecture material (notes, transcripts, slide PDFs) into a prioritised, exam-weighted study sheet. Two modes: revision (default) for fast review of already-learned material, and first-pass for learning cold when short on time. Trigger on "cram notes", "revision sheet", "high-yield/condensed study guide", "cut the fluff", "what's examinable", or turning a folder of lecture files into revision material; pick first-pass mode when the user says "first pass", "haven't learned this yet", or "teach me". Not for transcribing a live lecture (use lecture-notetaker) or a flat unprioritised recap (use lecture-condenser).

Cram Notes

What this produces

A self-contained Markdown study sheet per lecture series (usually a week, sometimes one lecture), in one of two modes. Both compress exhaustive lecture notes and surface what's examinable; they differ in how much teaching they keep.

Both modes share the same foundations:

1. Correctly prioritised — the ~20% that's genuinely examinable is kept and surfaced; background is demoted, not silently deleted.
2. Explained, not just listed — concepts lead with the causal idea, not a keyword chain.
3. Self-contained — every technical term is defined the first time it appears.
4. Fast to navigate — sparing bold, tables for anything structural, verified slide references.

Always write a new file and leave the source materials untouched — students fear losing detail, so the originals must remain as the safety net.

Two modes — pick the right one

REVISION mode (default). A lean cram sheet for someone who has already met the material and is reviewing before an exam. Compresses ~4–6×. Leads with the exam-answer sentence and trusts the reader to follow it. This is the default unless the user signals otherwise.

FIRST-PASS mode. A learning-from-cold sheet for someone who has not studied the topic and is short on time, so they're (riskily but deliberately) using these notes instead of the full notes for first contact. It keeps everything revision mode has, but adds back the teaching — the build-up that makes a concept understandable the first time, and the active-recall practice that makes it stick — while still cutting the true fluff. Longer than revision mode (~1.5–2.5×) but still well under half the original notes.

Choosing: default to revision mode. Switch to first-pass mode when the user says things like "first pass", "I haven't covered this yet", "learning it for the first time", "teach me", or "I don't have time to learn it properly". If genuinely ambiguous, ask which they want — the difference in output is large.

Either way: name the file so the mode is obvious, e.g. <Series> — Exam Cram.md (revision) or <Series> — First-Pass.md (first-pass).

Inputs — find the source material

A lecture series usually lives in a folder with three kinds of file per lecture:

• Full notes (.md) — exhaustive, often slide-by-slide. The main source of structured facts.
• Transcript (.txt) — near-verbatim lecturer audio. The main source of emphasis signals.
• Slides (.pdf) — figures and diagrams. Needed for image references.

Work with whatever is present: notes alone suffice; transcripts sharpen prioritisation; slides enable image references. If you can't tell which files belong to which week, ask rather than guess.

Workflow

1. Gather every source file for the series. Confirm scope and mode.
2. Read the full notes for each lecture to get the structured facts, named studies, and terms.
3. Skim the transcripts for emphasis signals (next section) — what separates high-yield from fluff. Don't skip when a transcript exists.
4. Build a verified slide map. Run scripts/slide_map.py <slides.pdf> for each PDF. Do not trust slide page numbers cited in the existing notes — they are frequently wrong (a real failure: a methods slide cited as "p.16" was actually p.23). Confirm each page from the PDF.
5. Triage every fact into keep-and-surface / keep-as-support / demote.
6. Write the sheet in the chosen mode, following references/output-template.md.
7. Verify against the checklist before presenting.

How to judge high-yield vs fluff — the heart of the skill

Relevance is not a guess. The source tells you what's examinable through three signals; weight them together.

Signal 1 — Time on topic. The transcript records how long the lecturer dwelt on each point. Two sentences = lower yield than something returned to repeatedly. Best single proxy for exam weight.

Signal 2 — Explicit signposting.

• Promote on: "the key thing", "you need to be able to", "remember this", "the important bit", "this is examinable", or repetition.
• Demote on: "don't worry about", "I won't go into detail", "just so you're aware", "just a recap", "this isn't the important bit", "we won't cover".

Signal 3 — Stated learning objectives. A fact serving an objective — a named experiment, mechanism, drug + action, defining contrast — is core. Background built on the way is support.

Rule of thumb: keep every named experiment, mechanism, drug, number, and contrast the lecturer spent real time on; demote the general background used only to get there. When genuinely unsure, keep it as support rather than cutting it — the student's fear is losing something testable.

Demote ≠ delete. Low-yield material goes in a short, labelled per-lecture box stating what was set aside and why, citing the lecturer's words where possible. This keeps the sheet honest and lets the student overrule the call instantly.

Formatting rules (both modes)

The failure mode of condensed notes is a wall of bold-peppered bullets that assert without explaining. Each rule fixes one part.

• Explanation-first. Open each concept with plain-English cause-and-effect — the answer a student would write — then the detail. Never compress a mechanism into a bare arrow-chain of keywords; an arrow chain only makes sense to someone who already understands it.
• Define every term on first use. Assume no prior exposure. Gloss jargon in a few words inline (e.g. "BrdU — a lab-made look-alike of thymidine that slots into new DNA and is detected with an antibody"). A short orientation box up top can pre-define the handful of terms used throughout.
• Bold sparingly. Bold only the term the student must write on the page — one or two per point.
• Tables for anything structural. Pathways, step sequences, comparisons, classifications go in tables or clean step-lists, never an inline arrow sentence. Most readability is won here.
• White space between concepts. A sub-heading per concept beats one long list.
• Slide image references. Beside a concept with a useful figure, add 🖼 [[<exact PDF filename>#page=N|Slide N — short label]], using the verified page. Use links ([[…]]) not embeds so the sheet stays scannable; tell the reader they can swap [[ for ![[ to render inline. Put references where a diagram/graph/image genuinely helps, not on every line.

What FIRST-PASS mode adds

Revision mode reminds; first-pass mode teaches. When in first-pass mode, add the following on top of the revision content — these are what make material land and stick on first contact:

• Build-up before the answer. Before the compressed exam-answer sentence, give the 1–3 sentences that get the reader there: the intuition, a short derivation, or a concrete analogy. Construct the idea rather than asserting it. (e.g. before "Klf9 frees synaptic input for newborns", first explain why new neurons must compete for input at all.)
• Interleaved retrieval practice. After each concept, pose a quick check-question with the answer placed just below (or in a foldable callout). Testing as you learn is the single biggest driver of first-pass retention — don't bunch all questions at the end.
• Keep the demoted background, compressed inline. The framing a revision sheet reduces to a one-line pointer is often what makes the core understandable cold — keep it, briefly.
• Walk through the key figures. For the diagrams that carry a concept, add a sentence or two on what the figure shows and how to read it, not just a slide link.
• A "how this connects" line per topic. Situate each piece in the week's bigger picture so the reader learns a structure, not isolated facts.
• A model answer per objective (not just 2–3 for the week) — seeing the full answer assembled is itself how the pattern is learned.
• Inline misconception flags at the moment each idea is introduced, so it isn't mis-encoded.

What first-pass mode must NOT re-add is the ceremony that makes original lecture notes slow: game plans, break timers, streak trackers, "% through lecture" markers, study schedules, and the focusing-question / blank-your-answer / sample-answer triple repeated for every slide. Keep the learning science (build-up + retrieval + worked examples); drop the ritual.

A clean alternative the user may prefer: deliver one layered file using foldable callouts — expanded it reads as the first-pass teaching version; collapse the build-up callouts and it becomes the lean revision sheet. Offer this when it suits; otherwise produce a dedicated first-pass file.

Output structure

Follow references/output-template.md. Both modes share: frontmatter + "How to read this" + an orientation box; a "Test yourself first" question checklist; per-lecture concept blocks grouped by the lecture's own objectives; a per-lecture low-yield box; and model answers. First-pass mode adds the build-up, interleaved checks, figure walk-throughs, connect-lines, and per-objective model answers described above.

Verify before finishing

• Slide references correct — every cited page confirmed against the PDF via the slide map.
• Source errors flagged — if the originals contain a mistake you caught (wrong page, wrong drug name, etc.), correct it and tell the user, since their other notes may still carry it.
• Every acronym/term defined on first use. Re-read as if you'd never seen the material.
• Nothing testable silently cut — removals appear in a low-yield box with a reason.
• (First-pass) every concept has a retrieval check, and hard mechanisms have build-up.
• Originals untouched; the sheet is a new file named for its mode.

Tone

Honest and student-respecting. The low-yield boxes and the "you can overrule me" framing matter: the student trusts you to throw things away. Never imply the sheet replaces the full notes — in revision mode it's a fast lane through them; in first-pass mode it's a time-boxed way to learn cold, with the real trade-off (shallower than full study) named rather than hidden.