Why Type Your Links
The problem with untyped links
When you draw an arrow between two notes without saying why they connect, that arrow carries almost no information. You know these two ideas are related — but in what way? Does one support the other? Contradict it? Provide an example? Is it a continuation of the same argument?
An untyped link is a question mark frozen in your graph. Future you — opening those notes weeks from now — will have to reconstruct the reasoning from scratch. The AI, which reads the structure of your graph, will know that a connection exists but not what it means.
Untyped link
“Note A → Note B.” Connected. But why? The relationship is invisible. The graph knows they're related — nothing more.
Typed link
“Note A tensions withNote B.” Now the graph carries the disagreement. The AI can surface this tension when relevant. You can find it again without rereading both notes.
What typing adds
A typed link does two things at once: it records the relationship for you, and it gives the AI something to work with.
For you
The type is a note to your future self. "I connected these because one deepens the other" — that intention is now retrievable without rereading.
For the AI
Relinkia uses relation types to make smarter suggestions. It can distinguish between notes that support each other and notes that contradict each other — and surface the right one at the right moment.
For the graph
Clusters of typed links reveal patterns. If you have many "tensions with" links around a concept, you're sitting on a productive disagreement worth exploring.
Never an obligation
An untyped link is still a valid link. If you're in flow and don't want to pause and classify, don't. Create the connection now, type it later — or never. The graph works without types; it works better with them.
Think of typing as enrichment, not taxonomy.You're not filing your notes into categories — you're preserving the reasoning that made you create a connection in the first place.