Gnosis is a customizable spaced repetition system designed to enhance memory retention through active recall. It allows users to set specific review intervals for note decks & tags, creating an optimal learning environment tailored to each specific topic/subject.

This manual is written for Gnosis version 0.5.0, released on 2025-06-17.

Introduction

Gnosis (γνῶσις) is a spaced repetition system that enhances memory retention through active recall. It employs a Q&A format, where each note consists of a question, answer, and explanation. Notes are reviewed at optimally spaced intervals based on the user’s success or failure to recall the answer. Key benefits arise from writing out answers when reviewing notes, fostering deeper understanding and improved memory retention.

Gnosis algorithm is highly adjustable, allowing users to set specific values not just for note decks but for tags as well. Gnosis’ adjustability allows users to fine-tune settings not only for entire note collections but also for specific tagged topics, thereby creating a personalized learning environment for each topic. Read more on 6

Adding notes

Creating notes for gnosis can be done interactively with:

M-x gnosis-add-note

Or from within gnosis-dashboard

Note Types

Each note is a thema consisting of the following components:

  • Keimenon; The main text or question.
  • Hypothesis; Assumptions/hints for the text to guide to the right answer
    • For example this is used as hints for cloze type or as choices in MCQs
  • Answer; The correct response or solution to the keimenon.
  • Parathema; expansion of keimenon, that can include links to e.g org-gnosis topics or even files, serving as a way to link org-gnosis topics to current thema.

Optionally, you can use also add tags for each note.

Notes/themas can have multiple hypotheses and answers (depending on their type), separated by gnosis-export-separator, which defaults to "\n-" (a new line followed by a dash).

Cloze

A cloze note type is a format where you create sentences or paragraphs with “missing” words. A fill-in-the-blanks question.

You can create a cloze note type using M-x gnosis-add-note and selecting Cloze.

Example format:

Default cloze format

* Thema                      :pharmacology:antimicrobials:penicillin:
:PROPERTIES:
:GNOSIS_ID: NEW
:GNOSIS_TYPE: cloze
:END:
** Keimenon 
What is the treatment for Actinomyces infection?

Penicillin

** Hypothesis 
- drug type

** Answer 
- Penicillin

** Parathema 
Sulfonamides → Nocardia
Actinomyces → [[id:680ca944-8ee9-4513-92d6-25696ee01f48][Penicillin]] 
(treatment is a SNAP)

Using anki-like syntax

* Thema                      :pharmacology:antimicrobials:penicillin:
:PROPERTIES:
:GNOSIS_ID: NEW
:GNOSIS_TYPE: cloze
:END:
** Keimenon 
{c1:Cyproheptadine::drug name} is a(n) {c2:5-HT2} receptor antagonist used to treat {c2:serotonin syndrome}

** Hypothesis 
- 

** Answer 
- 

** Parathema

You can format clozes like Anki if you so prefer with hints; e.g {{c1::Cyproheptadine::drug name}}

  • You can use the keyword :: to indicate a hint.

  • For each cX-tag there will be created a cloze type note, the above example creates 2 cloze type notes.

  • Each cX tag can have multiple clozes, but each cloze must be a UNIQUE word, or a unique combination of words, in given note.

    • If a cloze is repeated, such as in phrases with “acetyl” & acetylcholine, include whitespace in the cloze to denote a single word.

MCQ

Example format:

* Thema                                                            :clinical:
:PROPERTIES:
:GNOSIS_ID: NEW
:GNOSIS_TYPE: mcq
:END:
** Keimenon
A 60-year-old man comes to the physician with chills, nausea, and
diffuse muscle aches for 3 days. His niece had similar symptoms 2
weeks ago and H3N2 influenza strain was isolated from her respiratory
secretions. He received his influenza vaccination 2 months ago. His
temperature is 38.5°C. A rapid influenza test is
positive. Which of the following mechanisms best explains this
patient's infection despite vaccination?

** Hypothesis
- Random point mutations within viral genome
- Complementing with functional viral proteins
- Exchange of viral genes between chromosomes
- Reassortment of viral RNA segments
- Acquisition of viral surface proteins

** Answer
- Random point mutations within viral genome

** Parathema
Random point mutations within the viral genome are responsible for
antigenic drift, which creates a new virus strain.

Linking gnosis notes to org-gnosis content

org-gnosis is the note taking module of gnosis

  • You can create notes using M-x org-gnosis-find, to link them to a gnosis thema use M-x org-gnosis-insert to insert a link of said topic, either on the keimenon or parathema.

  • You can review gnosis questions that are linked to a topic by using M-x gnosis-review-topic.

Customization

Typos | String Comparison

You can adjust gnosis-string-difference, this is a threshold value for string comparison that determines the maximum acceptable Levenshtein distance between two strings, which identifies their similarity

Let’s illustrate with an example:

(setf gnosis-string-difference 1)

In this scenario, we set gnosis-string-difference to 1. This implies that two strings will be recognized as similar if they exhibit a difference of at most one character edit.

To demonstrate, ’example’ and ’examples’ will be recognized as similar, considering that the latter involves just one additional character."

Gnosis Algorithm

Each gnosis note has a gnosis score, which is a list of 3 values, (gnosis-plus gnosis-minus gnosis-synolon/total). Gnosis-synolon is what is used to determine the next interval upon a successful recall, gnosis-plus is added to gnosis-synolon upon a successful recall as well, gnosis-minus is subtracted from gnosis-synolon upon failing to recall a note’s answer.

Gnosis has 2 special events, one is anagnosis ανάγνωση and lethe λήθη.

Anagnosis Event

Anagnosis, which means comprehension & recognition of knowledge, is triggered when the consecutive successful or failed recalls are equal or greater to anagnosis value.

When anagnosis is triggered by consecutive successful recalls, epignosis value is added to gnosis-plus. Epignosis means accuracy of knowledge.

When anagnosis is triggered by consecutive failed recalls, agnoia value is added to gnosis-minus. Agnoia means lack of knowledge

You can set specific values for each deck and tag of the variables mentioned above by adjusting gnosis-custom-values.

Lethe event

The Lethe event triggers after a certain number of consecutive failures to recall an answer correctly.

When this threshold is reached, the next interval is reset to 0.

For example, with lethe value of 2, upon having 2 consecutive failed recalls the next review will be set for the current day.

Proto

The default initial interval is defined at gnosis-algorithm-proto, you can define a custom initial interval for each deck as well.

gnosis-algorithm-interval is a list of numbers, representing the first initial intervals for successful reviews. There is no limit on the length of the list.

Example:

(setq gnosis-algorithm-interval '(0 1 2 30))

Upon each successful note review, the algorithm will increment to the next interval value: 0 days (0), 1 day later (1), 2 days later (2), and 30 days later.

Upon failing to review a note without completing it’s proto successful reviews, it’s next review date will be on the same date.

Editing notes

  • Currently there are 2 ways for editing notes:
    • You can edit a note after review by pressing e
    • Open gnosis-dashboard with M-x gnosis-dashboard, find the note you want to edit and press e

Sync between devices

Gnosis uses git to maintain data integrity and facilitate synchronization across devices.

You will need to configure your remote manually.

Example:

cd ~/.emacs.d/gnosis # default location for gnosis, no-littering is ~/.emacs.d/var/gnosis
git init # After completing your first review session, a git repo should have been initialized automatically.
git remote add origin <remote_url>
git push --set-upstream origin master

You can interactively use gnosis-vc-push & gnosis-vc-pull. As the name suggests, they rely on vc to work properly.

Depending on your setup, vc might require an external package for the ssh passphrase dialog, such as x11-ssh-askpass.

To automatically push changes after a review session, add this to your configuration:

(setf gnosis-vc-auto-push t)
(gnosis-vc-pull) ;; Run vc-pull for gnosis on startup

Interactions with other software

emacs-no-littering

If you are a user of emacs-no-littering, you can theme Gnosis to fit its standards by adding the following snippet to your configuration:

(setq gnosis-dir (no-littering-expand-var-file-name "gnosis/"))

This sets gnosis-dir to ~/.emacs.d/var/gnosis, in line with the folders of other packages.

Contributing

Thank you for considering contributing back to gnosis. You can contribute by submitting a pull request on the codeberg mirror repository, or directly sending me patch via email.

How to create a patch

Example:

$ git clone https://git.thanosapollo.com/gnosis.git && cd gnosis
$ emacs something
$ git add something
$ git commit -m "Fix something"
$ git format-patch HEAD^1
0001-Fix-something.patch

You can sent the patch to “Thanos Apollo”, the email of which you can find on the git log.