Evaluate search results by reading only…

When This Fires

• When evaluating search results in a note system that uses progressive summarization
• When search returns many results and you need to quickly identify the most relevant ones
• When retrieval from your notes system feels slow relative to the information you know is there
• Complements Title notes with the natural-language words you'd search… (searchable titles) with the post-search evaluation technique

Common Failure Mode

Full-text scanning of every search result: opening each note and reading from top to bottom to determine relevance. This is the brute-force approach that progressive summarization was designed to eliminate. If you're reading full text to evaluate search results, either your notes aren't progressively summarized or you're not using the layers during retrieval.

The Protocol

(1) When search returns results, scan the list for title relevance first (Title notes with the natural-language words you'd search… — titles should contain search terms). (2) For potentially relevant results, open the note and scan only bold or highlighted passages. These are the pre-distilled key points. (3) If the bold passages match your current need → read the full context around them. (4) If the bold passages don't match → skip to the next result. Don't read the full note hoping the relevant part is hiding in the un-highlighted text. (5) If you frequently find relevant content in non-highlighted passages, your progressive summarization needs updating — the layers aren't capturing the right material. Flag these notes for re-summarization.