NotebookLM works strictly with the sources you give it, whether or not they’re PDFs, Google Docs, or notes, and helps you motive inside that materials.
That constraint is what makes NotebookLM really feel reliable. Nevertheless, it’s additionally what exposes its greatest limitation. Every pocket book exists in isolation, with no approach to cross-reference the opposite.
If I had monetary paperwork in a single pocket book and long-term objectives in one other, there was no approach to ask questions on each.
And that’s the place Gemini is available in. With Gemini’s capability to reference a number of NotebookLM notebooks in a single chat, that wall lastly got here down.
After I began utilizing them collectively, NotebookLM felt way more highly effective than earlier than.
NotebookLM and Gemini are nice collectively, however unstoppable with this app
The ultimate layer in my productiveness setup
NotebookLM’s greatest power can also be its greatest weak point
The limitation that stored displaying up
NotebookLM solely works with the sources you give it. It doesn’t pull in outdoors data, and it doesn’t attempt to fill gaps with guesses. That makes its solutions really feel grounded.
When it factors out a sample or summarizes an concept, you possibly can hint it again to a doc you uploaded.
Nevertheless, every pocket book is remoted from the others. To attach concepts successfully, you will need to manually mix paperwork right into a single pocket book.
Notes I write at present typically relate to paperwork I uploaded months in the past in a wholly totally different pocket book. So, the second I attempted to attach these dots, all the pieces broke down.
Pairing NotebookLM with Gemini
How Gemini adjustments the equation
With Gemini’s capability so as to add a number of NotebookLM notebooks right into a single dialog, I now not must merge all the pieces into one large pocket book.
Utilizing it’s simple. First, open the Gemini web site on a browser. Click on the + icon within the message field and choose NotebookLM. From there, you possibly can select a number of notebooks and choose Add.
After the notebooks are connected, you possibly can ask Gemini questions on all of them without delay, similar to you’d in a traditional dialog.
Now, Gemini acts as a connective layer, permitting insights to circulation between notebooks that have been by no means designed to speak with each other.
Meaning I can maintain my notebooks laser-focused, whereas Gemini handles the cross-referencing.
At present, NotebookLM notebooks don’t seem as selectable sources throughout the Gemini cellular app.
So as to add a pocket book as a supply, you’ll must open Gemini on the net, both on a desktop or a cellular browser.
How I exploit this pairing in on a regular basis conditions
The place the NotebookLM and Gemini mixture shines
The true good thing about utilizing NotebookLM with Gemini is clear in every day eventualities, significantly when your information is distributed throughout varied notebooks and codecs.
If I’m engaged on a long-term mission, equivalent to a transfer, funds planning, or an enormous work project, my data is never obtainable in a single place.
I do know that a number of notebooks have data I wish to reference, so I add all of them to a single Gemini chat. I’d add notebooks with my private finance objectives, journal entries, and a 3rd with related work emails and message threads.
With Gemini pulling them right into a single dialog, I can lastly ask questions that span all three.
As an example, whether or not my objectives are reasonable given present bills, or how a piece deadline clashes with one thing I’ve already flagged as necessary in my journal.
Gemini pulls context from all of the notebooks without delay, and I can lastly get solutions that replicate the total image.
Turning notebooks into a greater studying system
My notes lastly really feel related
Earlier than pairing NotebookLM with Gemini, most of my previous notebooks have been successfully archives.
I’d put effort into organizing sources and extracting summaries, however when a mission ended, I not often used these notes once more.
Cross-referencing notebooks via Gemini adjustments that dynamic.
After I add a number of notebooks to a Gemini chat, older materials abruptly turns into related once more, as a result of it connects to one thing I’m engaged on now.
A query a few present downside would possibly floor insights from a pocket book I hadn’t opened in months.
The most effective half is that I don’t must reorganize or rewrite something. Gemini does the connective work, pulling context from throughout notebooks solely when it’s wanted.
In consequence, I’m extra snug preserving notebooks targeted, realizing they gained’t grow to be useless ends.
Even tough or incomplete sources really feel price saving, as a result of they’ll nonetheless contribute later when seen alongside different notebooks.
A bonus is that I can simply export the dialog on to Google Docs. All it takes is clicking the three-dot menu icon under the chat and deciding on Export to Docs.
Exporting conversations immediately turns cross-notebook insights right into a doc I can edit or share.
The unlikely pairing that upgraded my NotebookLM expertise
NotebookLM remains to be the place I make sense of prolonged PDFs, articles, emails, and paperwork.
Utilizing it with Gemini immediately supercharges the expertise by letting me reference a number of notebooks at a time.
Probably the most important distinction is that I now not really feel pressured to over-organize or predict future use circumstances.
I can maintain notebooks targeted and even a bit messy, realizing they gained’t grow to be useless ends.
After I must make sense of one thing, whether or not it’s studying throughout topics, scattered notes, or revisiting previous concepts, Gemini offers me a approach to analyze multiple pocket book.