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I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

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Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#201
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slow in the sense of “idea->Search for app->Open app->new note->type on screen” vs “idea->alt tab to terminal->type on keyboard.” It’s probably only 2 seconds vs 1 second. Not a huge time amount.

This is a dumb question but have you tried, like, putting your chosen Note App somewhere prominent in your phone? Like, on the first page of the home screen, or in the dock if you’d on iOS? But whatever works, if you prefer to lose an idea because it’s “faster” to wait until you’re at a keyboard, it’s your life. Or just keep a physical notebook of some kind with you. That’s faster than any digital method for just cap…

Thanks for trying to help me debug. This is with notes on front screen in an easily tap able spot.

I currently keep a paper notebook for the reason you give.

Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#202

The market for markdown editors and note-takers is already saturated. Joplin appears to have all the features yours does and probably more, plus it is open source. There are a handful of other open source Markdown editors as well for note-taking that have most (if not more) of the features you are including. I don't know why anyone would pick a subscription service when they can get the same thing for free and have a…

If it is saturated (and by inference, unwanted), why do note taking apps consistently front-page? I can think of two possible reasons. One, there is no clear winner, and nobody has made the note taking app everyone _really_ wants. Or two, note apps are a bit like IDE's, where people use them all the time and subtle preferences mean a variety of apps doing the same thing is preferred.

It really comes down to the subscription-based model being profitable for people that think paying for something means they'll get a better product. People will find an open source solution and rebrand it for a $5 or $10/mo and have it sync to a server somewhere, and then move on to rebranding another solution. You can find a ton of apps in the app store where they do this.

Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#204
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the sentiment against Electron, there are horribly bloated applications out there which are a direct consequence of how (badly) Electron was built and designed. However, this particular application appears to work exactly as intended and uses all of 150MB of RAM and 0.1% CPU on my (admittedly quite beefy) laptop. Maybe, just maybe, this is actually a pretty well-built application? I understand if someone won't…

Windows 98 needed 16 MB RAM and 120-295 MB harddrive storage. Why would a note taking app need more memory than an entire OS? Because browsers are their own OS pretty much, and shipping one per application is not ideal.

Can we stop this kind of non-constructive criticism? Nobody here would ever choose to voluntarily go back to Windows 98 or anything similar from that era.

Using this same logic we'd be demanding that Netflix run over a 56K modem. It's a completely not realistic.

I would very much like to see your cloud syncing solo-developed markdown note taking app with HTML rendering available for Mac, Windows, Linux, Android, and iOS that uses under 16 MB of RAM. Or maybe you could point me to something of the sort that existed in 1998.

I'm sure you've got a quick link to that so I'm looking forward to trying it out.

Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#206

It looks good, and I like your pricing model more than the Standard Notes one (I don't want to drop $149 at once on a web app, but the 75% discount for doing so makes the monthly price seem way too expensive). Two things that stop me pulling the trigger: 1. I need a web app. I want to be able to call up my notes from a computer, anywhere, without installing anything. 2. A 60 day trial seems like the wrong way to test…

The author here. > A much smaller (5-10MB) quota with no time limit That's interesting and I basically agree with your opinion. You will be more comfortable to try it. But I suspect that many free riders will come eat the server resources. This is not a startup. I would rather like to be small.

I wouldn't be following their advice, I think the time limit is great and you should stick to it. 5-10MB of note data could be a lot, meaning you'd end up with users you've replied to that will never pay.

I wouldn't be listening to any feedback from someone who isn't going to buying your product anyway!

OP they replied to: it's the dev's choice to figure out the way to ship a trial of their 3 years of hard work. If you don't like that you're more than welcome to ship your own demo of your own application.

Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#208

Boostnote is a similar open source project. Even they look similar.

Plus you don't pay out the ass for someone to hold your data.

I tried InkDrop and couldn't justify the steep price point for something so trivial.

I backup everything on my own and watch Boostnote grow as a competitor, but free...

Re: I've been building a Markdown note-taking app for 3 years

#209

Running a project for three years alone on the side takes a lot of discipline. So often we become 'passionate' about some projects and quickly abandon them once the initial excitement wears off. Congratulations to the author! Eerily, I have also been building a Markdown note-taking app alone for 2 years [0]. It is also e2e encrypted, but compared to Inkdrop, needs more work on the UI. But it works perfectly as a CLI.…

It helps to be working on something you want to exist and use every day. You've already validated your product/market fit at that point, even if your market only consists of 1 person.
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