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Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

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Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#51

Post by oneearedrabbit »

wslh wrote: post #37
oneearedrabbit wrote: post #11

I am excited to see more solutions that work with Apple Notes database directly. This is my go-to application to capture unstructured memos while researching various topics. Last year I got carried away and built a simple site generator for Notes [0]. As a fun exercise I implemented ORM models to query Sqlite database in Ruby: User::Account.server(database: "tmp/test.sqlite").first. folders_dataset.offset(1).first no…

I would love to have a tool to retrieve the hyperlink of the current note so you can organize the information as a wiki. I know it uses URIs.

I was toying with this idea, and the best (and also the worst) workaround I found is to share a note with yourself; then link a note with ⌘-k. I tried doing this a couple of times--nah, it is a workaround.

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#52

Post by mark_l_watson »

ChintanGhate wrote: post #20

I have published an app [Exporter]( https://apps.apple.com/us/app/exporter/id1099120373?mt=12 ) that does something similar - exports Apple Notes to HTML and markdown with the attachments. Give it a try, let me know if it solves your issue. Also, why did you select JSON as the output format?

Worked well for me, thanks.

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#53

Post by js2 »

IggleSniggle wrote: post #47
tzs wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From your article on how you wrote that: > I've been stubbornly refusing to learn AppleScript for nearly twenty years at this point. Thanks to ChatGPT I can continue not to learn it, but I can now use it to solve problems The Apple scripting stuff can also use JavaScript. It might be better to continue not to learn in JavaScript instead of AppleScript, if ChatGPT is as adept at Apple scripting in JavaScript as it see…

I was trying to do a thing with AppleScript, and the barriers I ran into were not with the language, but with discovery of the APIs that Apple surfaces to the end user. In that regard, you’re better off with AppleScript. I can’t believe just how bad the AppleScript documentation is, but the js documentation is even worse; using js is just using AppleScript but with an additional layer of indirection that doesn’t prov…

There's an O'Reilly AppleScript book that's pretty good.

The problem I always had with AppleScript is that it wasn't clear when I was writing AppleScript and when I was talking to an application's OSA dictionary (its "terminology" as Apple calls it in OSA).

Once I switched to Appscript (https://appscript.sourceforge.io/), that confusion went away. Of course I haven't used that in years since it's no longer supported and today I'd use JavaScript.

The issue though is that each application's terminology is isn't really documented. You can usually figure it out using Script Editor, but not always.

Some of this is documented here:

https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/La...

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#54

Post by mcint »

tzs wrote: post #26
simonw wrote: post #15

I wrote a similar tool in Python a few weeks ago, which uses AppleScript to liberate the data and saves it to a SQLite database: https://datasette.io/tools/apple-notes-to-sqlite I didn't actually know AppleScript before writing this tool... but it turned out ChatGPT knew it well enough to unblock me and provide me with exactly the code I needed to build the rest of the project! https://til.simonwillison.net/gpt3/chat…

From your article on how you wrote that: > I've been stubbornly refusing to learn AppleScript for nearly twenty years at this point. Thanks to ChatGPT I can continue not to learn it, but I can now use it to solve problems The Apple scripting stuff can also use JavaScript. It might be better to continue not to learn in JavaScript instead of AppleScript, if ChatGPT is as adept at Apple scripting in JavaScript as it see…

IggleSniggle expresses it well. As ugly as the AppleScript expressions are, they force you to write in a way that's sympathetic to the API, so, in addition to returning errors at all in more cases, they're easier to diagnose or minimize.

https://gist.github.com/mcint/561f72e6baa3e5c68c2577b04dad78...

I've linked some of my scripts, bash calling applescript, that I use extensively to export tabs from browsers.

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#56

Post by amunster »

mkmk wrote: post #2

I consistently struggle with Notes and iMessage sync issues, and I suspect it’s due to being a customer for so many years and making my way through many devices over those years. The UX of the Apple ecosystem is so nice but when it goes sideways you’re kind of out of luck, even if you have applecare. I wish they had some sort of premium “fix my esoteric appleID account issues” service you could pay them for once a de…

I had a sync related issue with Messages.app on macOS recently. Escalated through apple support. The solution was to reinstall macOS from scratch. Not pretty but a small price to pay.

Now my lingering issue is with search: Calendar events and Reminders prior to the reinstall date do not appear in search results. This has been an issue for years on both macOS and iOS! Much Google searching was no help.

I wish that premium fix service included useful forums and…search.

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#57

Post by eviks »

Kerrick wrote: post #31
howinteresting wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A notes app that only works with one 2-trillion-dollar company's hardware and does not have builtin functionality to export notes (e.g. a menu option to do so) cannot reasonably be described as good. One's expectations have to be through the floor for that to be an honest appraisal. Compare it to Obsidian, which just stores data in a bunch of markdown files on disk.

I can export to Text and/or PDF on my iPhone from the Notes app.

That doesn't count since text is destructive export is pdf is just as bad (also, batch export?)

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#59

Post by eviks »

macintux wrote: post #34
howinteresting wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're commenting on the website for a project called "Apple Notes Liberator". Obsidian does not need a "liberator".

You're moving the goalposts. Your first comment: > and does not have builtin functionality to export notes (e.g. a menu option to do so) That's incorrect: you can export to PDF. Certainly not as handy as Markdown, but it's there. Additionally, Apple offers AppleScript as a way to do even more. No, this isn't an open source piece of software. If that's your sole criteria for "good" then you're right, it's bad.

No goal posts move when the original issue is not resolved with the proposed solution Like, without any menu you can export your notes to a screenshot, but you wouldn't accept it as an export option, would you? Similarly, PDF is an awful format for notes, so the fact that it exists doesn't solve the issue that you can't export your notes (which at a minimum you need to be able to do in batches, not individual notes)

Re: Show HN: Apple Notes Liberator – Extract Notes.app Data and Save It as JSON

#60

Post by eviks »

CharlesW wrote: post #13
Alifatisk wrote: post #9

So now we know how to export data from the notes.app, messages.app & reminders.app. What’s next?

At https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204055 , Apple provides instructions for a bunch of stuff you might want to export: • iCloud Drive files • Photos and videos • Mail • Contacts • Calendar • Reminders • Safari • Notes • Voice Memos And/or you can use https://privacy.apple.com/ , which is basically Apple's version of Google Takeout.

These are a joke of instructions, per-note app-only export to an awful pdf format
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