How to organize your sources (digital system)

Question

I'm using an application to store and work on my research. I can have a source, with multiple entities referring to it. Each entity has a unique "page" for the source. Additionally each source can have multiple media items under it. So I have sources like:

• United States Census, 1920
• United States Census, 1930
• United States Census, 1940
• Pennsylvania Death Certificates
• Ohio Marriage Records
• Ohio Marriage Certificate
• Ohio Death Certificate

Under each source I have Media images labeled like:

• United States Census, 1930
  • Carnegie Ward 1, 15B
  • Pittsburgh Ward 12, 6B
  • Cleveland District 809, 10B
• Ohio Death Certificate
  • 1939, #44796
  • 1948, #67623
  • 1950, #66703

Each person/event is then sourced like:

• John Doe, Death
  • Ohio Death Certificate, Page: 1939, #44796
• Jane Doe, Death
  • Ohio Death Certificate, Page: 1948, #67623
• Mary Poppins, Census
  • United States Census, 1930, Page: Cleveland District 809, 10B

Is this OK? Should I be doing it different? I thought about having each item be a source Ohio Death Certificate, Page: 1948, #67623 but then I would have a ton of sources in no real groups. Right now I'm at < 500 people and < 100 documents but I'm getting more documents each day. What so people with > 1000 people and documents do?

Answer 1

There is a somewhat related question: How should I organise my digital documents?

For the specifics of your question, what you specify above is a good system and is just as I would do it.

If you feel you have too many individual sources, then you should group the sources by source type, e.g. Birth Records, Photos, Correspondence, Online, Interviews, etc., as I outline in my answer to the other question where I recommend source-based folder organization.