This Free App Is a Game-Changer For Students | Arc Workspace Set Up

Summary

In this video, the creator introduces 'Extended Brain in Arc,' a system designed to enhance productivity in studies, work, and life. After a transformative meeting with the Arc browser team, the creator was inspired to craft an ideal workspace for students. Partnering with Arc, they offer a giveaway that includes a study skills mini-quest. The video guides viewers through setting up Arc, utilizing its unique features like the sidebar, spaces for different modes, and the ability to share these spaces. It also covers customization, productivity hotkeys, and the 'Easel' feature for visual learning. The creator shares a personal productivity system and encourages viewers to adopt Arc for a streamlined online experience.

Takeaways

• 😀 The video introduces 'Extended Brain in Arc,' a system designed to enhance productivity in studies, work, and life by saving time.
• 🔗 The creator shares their positive experience with a browser company, which inspired them to create an ideal workspace for students.
• 🎁 A special offer is presented: a chance to win a workspace setup along with a study skills mini-quest for free.
• 🖥️ The video provides a tutorial on setting up Arc, including importing data from other browsers and customizing the interface.
• 🗂️ 'Spaces' in Arc allow users to create separate profiles for different activities, each with its own history, passwords, and extensions.
• 🔗 The concept of 'Extended Brain' is further explained through the sharing of a pre-configured space designed for learning and focusing.
• 🛠️ The video highlights Arc's unique features like the sidebar, which can be hidden for a cleaner view, and the ability to customize the browsing experience.
• 🔍 Arc's search functionality is showcased, including the ability to directly ask queries and receive summarized search results.
• 🎨 The 'Easel' feature is introduced as a tool for visual learning, allowing users to create and share visual notes and diagrams.
• 📚 The importance of organizing information is emphasized through the use of folders and the 'inbox' system for temporary storage and easy access.
• 🔗 The video concludes with an invitation to access the extended brain space and a study skills mini-quest to enhance academic performance.

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Outlines

00:00

🤔 Introduction to the Extended Brain in Arc

The speaker introduces an organizational system called the 'Extended Brain in Arc', designed to streamline studies, work, and life. They recount their experience with a browser company that led them to create this system. The speaker is excited about the tools being developed and decides to share a workspace setup with viewers, including a study skills mini-quest. They provide a special invite link for viewers to start using Arc on Mac or Windows and guide them through the installation process, including importing data from other browsers, customizing the browser's appearance, and setting preferences.

05:01

🔧 Setting Up and Customizing Arc

The speaker demonstrates how to set up Arc, including adding favorite apps, customizing the browser's theme, and enabling extensions. They discuss the benefits of Arc's sidebar and how it can be hidden or pinned open. The concept of 'spaces' in Arc is introduced, allowing users to create different profiles for various activities, each with its own browsing data and extensions. The speaker also shows how to share spaces and how they can be added to one's Arc browser, emphasizing the ease of use and the ability to maintain consistency across different devices.

10:02

🎨 Personalizing and Enhancing Productivity with Arc

The speaker continues by showing how to personalize Arc with boosts, which allow users to customize the appearance of websites and apps, making them more enjoyable and less anxiety-inducing. They also discuss the use of hotkeys to increase productivity and provide a quick tutorial on essential shortcuts. The speaker then explains how to use Arc's split view feature for research and learning, making it easier to cross-reference information and stay organized. They highlight the benefits of the three-folder system (projects, resources, inbox) for organization and how it syncs across devices.

15:04

🧠 Maximizing Learning and Organization with Arc's Features

The speaker delves into how Arc can be used to navigate the internet effectively, focusing on search capabilities that allow for direct queries to AI and the creation of resource folders. They demonstrate how Arc can summarize web pages and assist with research, making the process more efficient and enjoyable. The use of 'Easel' for creating visual notes, diagrams, and mood boards is introduced, along with the ability to share these with others for collaboration. The speaker concludes by discussing the importance of the 'inbox' folder for saving work and the option to share folders with others, emphasizing how these features can help users become more productive and organized.

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Transcripts

this is the extended brain in Arc it's a

simple system I created that organizes

your studies work and life so you can

save time and become an academic weapon

about 7 months ago I got to meet the

browser company I used chrome for 15

years I never thought I'd leave but

after meeting the team and using the

tool and seeing the vision behind what

they're building I was sold really

really cool stuff they're working on I

can't say anything in this video at

least but uh wow crazy that trip

inspired me to create the dream

workspace I wish I had as a student and

so in this video I'm partnering up with

Arc and I'm giving away that workpace

which comes with a study skills mini

quest for free because I want this to be

your year all I ask is that you check

out Ark it's also free and it might just

change your

life I'm going to do this video in two

parts first how to set up Arc and the

extended brain and then how to use it

there's a special invite link below in

the comments and description to get

either started on Mac or Windows and

we'll through the installation together

you are going to have to make an account

I would recommend importing everything

from chrome or Safari if you have it

choose the apps you use most I can add

Spotify here you don't really have to

worry about this you can even skip it if

you want to and I'm going to also skip

this you can add a theme to your browser

this is really cool let's make it red we

can make it a bit more saturated or not

and click next and sure I will enable U

block and also enable Max and do I want

to make Arc my default yes absolutely

now get started so the first thing

you'll notice on the top left here those

four favorite apps already appear in the

favorites area here you can actually add

as many as you want to um I'll add a few

more here

like these ones all you have to do is

just click and drag the tabs and move

them in into this area up here I'm a

little bit OCD so I actually kind of

just want to have clean even rows like

that um and no more than six so what I

love about Arc is that it's more than

just a browser it's an extension of the

way that I even use my computer right

it's like a home dashboard where all the

things are completely integrated with

the internet often times I actually find

myself using the web app version of

these apps like notion and Spotify and

slack and stuff more so than the desktop

apps because of all the cool features

that Arc has that we can use and don't

worry we're going to cover those in a

little bit but first we have to address

the elephant in the room which is the

sidebar now if your first gut reaction

is I hate this it's so weird why is the

sidebar on the left trust me that's

completely normal it's called

familiarity bias you're used to seeing

it at the top bar and it just you to see

it on the left side here but I promise

you just give it a few hours and you'll

really start to enjoy how much cleaner

and content focused it is with the

sidebar on the left side and in fact you

can actually click this button here to

hide the sidebar so it disappears like

wow so much beautiful right and if you

hover your cursor over the left side of

the screen it'll pop back up and then

you can pin it open again I find that

vertical space in browsers is so much

more practical than horizontal space

when you go to most websites there's

usually a lot of extra Dead Space here

on the sides that you can just get rid

of and it's kind of what most apps like

notion are doing now anyways with this

extra sidebar here or finder and

explorers in file management do that so

it kind of makes sense for our browser

to do the same and speaking of folders

let's start to set up our spaces this is

similar to how in Chrome you can create

different profiles but with how tedious

it is to switch between them I never

really used it but in Arc it's way

simpler to make a new space just click

on the plus here at the bottom click new

space and each space can have its own

profile which means it can have

different history it can have different

password wordss logins extensions

browsing data and everything so it

really really creates that separation

let's call this one chill I love this

feature it really helps create

separation between work mode chill mode

stalker mode or any other type of

workpace that you might need but my

favorite thing about spaces is that you

can share them and that's how you're

going to grab my extended brain space

for Learning and focusing so in the

description there's a link for my shared

space once you get access to that and I

click it you'll see right here that you

can get the extended brain it's from

Maddie and it comes with three different

folders all you have to do very simply

is Click add space to Arc and boom now

you have this space automatically

installed into your brain you can

actually share spaces with anyone on any

browser cuz Arc is nice like that and

they don't try to force you into an

ecosystem to stay productive I find a

lot of benefit with having consistency

across all of my organization and that

way I don't have to try to organize

things 100 different ways I always just

know that there's a system that I can

rely on I just learned a simple system

it goes rip resources in box projects

and I would duplicate this system for

every single space that I made because

for all the different things that I do I

might have different projects in

different areas of my life I have

different resources and I have different

things that are going to be kept in my

inbox an inbox is just a place that we

store things temporarily so we can get

to them later I don't want to lose them

but I don't want to get to them right

now so you can actually just keep

extending your workflow by adding that

same space multiple times so I'm just

going to go back and hit add to Arc

again and do it one more time and now

I've created three different spaces here

and all you have to do is just rename

them for the areas of your life so maybe

this one here I'm going to rename this

one to study because that's what I'm

going to be doing when I'm studying

maybe this one here is going to be for

my club or and this last one I just want

to chill with and you can change the

icon let's change the icon for this

student one to a

book and now I can just quickly switch

between my Spaces by clicking on the

different icons down here and I have

very clear separation between when I'm

doing school stuff when I'm doing work

stuff or when I'm just chilling I think

our workspaces should enable creativity

right like when I genuinely love the

tools and stuff that I use I feel like I

do my best work you can't beat someone

who's just having fun and love what they

do so I want to show you one more way to

make this extended brain truly yours

sometimes we have to use websites and

apps that are kind of bland or give us

anxiety and it sucks all the fun out of

learning for example the dreaded

Blackboard right so on any site if if

you go up to the URL area and you click

on the site control center you'll see a

paintbrush go ahead and click that and

then something will pop up called boost

and you can change the color of the

website to something a bit more fun and

you can even change the font to

something a little bit more chill that

matches your Vibe and if you ever want

to get rid of it go ahead and just click

on the circle here I'll give you one

more cool example of using boosts and I

definitely recommend you do it in

YouTube so this High control center

again click on the paintbrush and this

time what I'm going to do is I'm going

to click zap and with zap you can zap

away and hide elements that you don't

want to see um on certain websites so

for me I think shorts are super

distracting especially when I'm working

so I'm just going to go ahead and click

and zap on that to get rid of it boom it

disappears there like that I'm going to

do the same thing with breaking news I

don't think this is super useful for me

I don't want to see that I got to get

rid of that um playables I don't really

know what that is I'm going to get rid

of this as well get zapped and with that

our extended brain Arc is set up now

onto the cool part if if you want to

become an academic weapon you need to

learn how to wield it so let's go

through how to use this workspace to

become dangerously productive lethal to

your work so it's on its knees begging

you for Mercy but you don't care you

slit his throat anyways and then you

gouge out its eyeballs whoa sorry I

probably should slow down on the coffee

a little bit so let's start with a

speedrun through the must no hot keys

this is going to get you the most bang

for your buck command T opens a new tab

command W archives a tab command shift T

revives an archive tab control tab

toggles between open tabs command option

Arrow toggles between spaces command

shift C copies the current page URL so

you can paste it anywhere you want to

command s toggles the sidebar there are

tons of other hot Keys you can use to

really suck out more productivity from

Arc and a pro tip here is if you use

command T again this is actually more

than just a new tab if you hit tab you

can actually go to the different actions

there's something called edit keyboard

shortcuts and you can actually view all

of the different options you have and

customize them yourself so if matches

whatever hand configuration or workflows

and stuff that you already use the hot

keys are just the first step to getting

the most out of Arc and so let me walk

you through how I would use the extended

brain to learn something and then stay

organized at the end of it so I'm ready

to keep going tomorrow so let's say that

you're doing some research for class and

you want to cross reference this

information here with AI this is pretty

much something that I always do now to

speed up the learning process normally

on Mac you'd have to open up another

window or something and then you have to

like move it side by side like this

because because Apple stuff sucks at

letting you move things left to right

and you have to kind of finagle with

this to to make it right I think it's so

freaking annoying how Apple makes it

very difficult for this to work well Arc

had this genius idea of building in a

native split view all I have to do is

create a new tab for chat GPT or

something and then click and drag the

tab either into the browser itself or

onto the tab that I want to split screen

it with and boom just like that we have

a very clean easy split view and I can

easily adjust it using the slider in the

middle or using this box at the top here

to see my split view options I can add

another split view to make it a three

panel split view or even four or even

five I think it gets kind of hard unless

you have like an ultra wide monitor or

something to use that and it gets even

better because instead of having to set

this up every time I can actually just

move this split screen into my resources

or something into this pinned tabs area

and I can also rename it if I wanted to

so this is GPT plus research or

something and I can even give it a

different icon so that I can remember it

by let's choose a robot for a GPT and

now if I ever want to come back to it

saved in my resources and that's

actually a pretty good one I actually

like having this and now with Arc search

the iOS and iPad OS companion apps this

three folder system here the projects

resources and inbox is actually synced

across all of my advices and makes

accessibility for my brain even faster

it might not seem like much but trust me

those little prod activity things add up

really quick for example really useful

when I'm away from my desk maybe I need

to quickly pull up project documents or

resources and stuff I don't have to go

digging through hundreds of apps

messages search or logins I know I can

always find it using this three- folder

system and I can add to it from any

device and seamlessly sync it across my

workflow all of this so far is how I use

this extended brain system for

organization but now let's get into the

really interesting stuff and probably

what you've been waiting for which is

how I use this system to navigate the

internet so first things first is search

because why do we use the internet well

we want to look up stuff right we want

to find stuff we want to share things

and for me I want that experience to be

as frictionless and simple as possible

so with Arc there are actually a few

ways to find exactly what you're looking

for on the internet in the exact way

that you want it so for example

sometimes I'm not searching for a

specific article or a specific page or a

specific website I just want an answer

so what I'm going to do is use command T

to open up my search I'm going to type

in GPT and you'll see here if I hit tab

again I can just directly ask a query to

chat GPT without even having to go to

GPT itself um what is alss and it'll

automatically give me a search query

with exactly what I'm looking for but as

we all know Chad GPT isn't perfect it

can make mistakes or maybe I do want to

go deeper with my search but I still

want to avoid the problem of having to

sift through a whole bunch of different

search results and find the best ones

I'm lazy I just want the internet to

bring it to me you now I'm going to hit

command T again and I'm just going to

ask Arc this time create a folder with

the best resources to treat high blood

pressure in children and this time I'm

going to hold shift and hit enter and

what it's going to do for me is search

for the web and then compile in a folder

for me three of the best articles that I

just asked it for so I don't have to do

any searching it just comes to me right

here in my sidebar in a nice folder I'm

going to go ahead and drop that into my

inbox so I can look at it later and I

know what you're thinking you're

probably skeptical how do I know these

are the best three resources or not

trust me I'm also a man of science so

let's actually just do a Google search

as well how do you treat high blood

pressure in children sometimes we do

need to get our hands dirty and do our

own research but Arc can still help us

out here because on a Google search if

you hover your cursor over any link Arc

will actually automatically summarize

for you what that page is about so you

can get a quick summary of what you're

about to get into so you don't waste

your time and overcommit to something

that's not very useful all right so

let's say that I do want to commit to

reading this article here on high blood

pressure in children and Adolescence and

as I expected it is really long and it

looks really

boring so what I'm going to do is I'm

going to use command F and instead of

just trying to find a particular word or

phrase I'm actually just going to have a

conversation with AI to summarize this

page for you so summarize the main ideas

and

findings from this article give me in

bullet points and I'm going to hit ask

and Arc is going to read for me really

quickly it didn't read the whole thing

cuz it was too long um but it's going to

give me the main bullet points from this

paper here I don't know why other apps

haven't also adopted this yet and I'm

pretty sure they're going to follow suit

once they see this but usually when we

use command F to find something on a

page I don't really care about that word

looking for I want to understand I want

to understand the context around it I

understand why that is and that's what

using Arc like this allows me to do it

goes deeper than just finding a phrase

and you can actually ask follow-up

questions to your query um to continue

clarifying and this can be a really

useful way to get through like you know

dense research papers articles right how

does this compare to adult

treatment this article does not comp

prare the treatment of hypertension to

adults okay so the limitations here is

that using this find here it can't

search other sites and access the rest

of the internet it can only see what's

on this page but it will infer key

differences based on the information

provided it makes researching and

finding information on the internet

which usually is so you know boring

monotonous and high friction way easier

streamlined and actually kind of fun as

many of you know I run a learning skills

program called study Quest where we help

Learners build system sys to learn

faster be more productive and unlock

their potential and according to

research one of the best ways to learn

is to be able to express our ideas

visually in a way that's not restricted

by formatting our text and stuff and

there's a feature in Arc that I've been

using kind of a lot recently called

easel so to make a new easel I'm going

to click the plus here I'm going to

click new easel and easel is exactly

what I just said we can put text

anywhere we want to um there's a little

toolbar at the bottom here you can add

images that come from you know your

computer or you can actually just copy

and paste images from across the web if

you um wanted to split screen or

something like this and just you can

copy images over like this and paste

them into your easel if you want to draw

a little diagram you

can handdraw

things if you want to you can use arrows

to connect things around you can create

boxes behind stuff that are colored you

can paste links in here as well and if

you just click on the link in the easel

it'll go back to that page as well I've

really been using easel to create mood

boards to sketch notes to brainstorm

ideas draw diagrams Tre notes mind maps

and the best part is that you can share

these easel by clicking on this little

person icon here with anyone to view or

even collaborate on with your group so

if you have group projects to work on if

you want to create little study guides

together um this feature can easily make

you uh the favorite person in the group

so let's say that I've just finished all

my work for the day feeling kind of

tight

I don't want to lose all the work I've

done and that's what this inbox folder

is for an inbox like I said is just a

place to store things that we don't want

to forget and there's this line here

you'll see in Arc anything below here

will automatically be archived um after

a certain time period but everything

that you move above the line will be

saved so you can always revisit it later

so anything that I want to keep I'm just

going to go ahead and move it up into

this inbox area um so that I don't lose

that stuff and if you wanted to you can

actually share your folder with your

friends because you're nice like that

and anyone who gets that folder is going

to get all the links all of the easel

all the stuff that you've put in there

and then pick up where you left off this

is a great way to share resources to

share project information to you know

work on projects together group work and

you can quickly become everyone's best

friend the one thing to keep in mind is

that if you do share this folder people

won't receive updates so you can have to

reshare it again if you add more links

or you change things around in that

folder and that my friends is how I

would use my extended brain in Ark to

abuse this thing called the internet to

become an academic weapon I didn't even

touch on half of the cool features Arc

has and I'm sure they have a lot more

planned for the future as I mentioned if

you want to grab this extented brain

space along with the mini quest to

improve your study skills I'll leave a

link in the description it's completely

free seriously I just want to help you

guys destroy this year without stress no

one ever did that for me so I want to at

least do my part and pay it forward to

all of you guys that way you can have

more time for side hustles projects and

then maybe we can work together on on

those things in the future if you want

to extend your brain even further then I

actually created a completely done for

you system to plan a study schedule and

I go over all the details in that

workflow in this video over here