Note Taking in 2021 • Hacker News Board

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#171

Post by jkmcf » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 3:54 PM UTC

reacharavindh wrote: post #79

tptacek wrote: post #6

This is going to be one of those threads where everyone rattles off their own note-taking setup, which is great and all. So: There's a lot of things people tend to want from note-taking setups: easy entry, navigation and organization, wiki-like linkages, export to various formats, encryption. What I've found actually matters for my day-to-day and gets me to actually take lots of notes, though, is just (1) search and…

Apple Notes user and fan here. Being able to drag and drop images to a note and annotating it is super useful to me. Also, being able to pickup writing or sketching on the iPad or iPhone works superb. Being part of the walled-garden and all. I wanted to try Bear after reading your comment. But, I don’t need yet another subscription software. If it was a one time paid app, I would have thought of it, but subscription…

While I don't despise subscriptions, I do despise subscriptions priced disproportionately (IMO) to the value and my usage frequency.

Bear is priced appropriately. Can't wait for the new version (some anticipate 2030, but I'm optimistic based on the new Panda editor beta).

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#172

Post by emptyparadise » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 4:18 PM UTC

Multicomp wrote: post #115

emptyparadise wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if I want to include an image in my notes?

Onenote has no markdown, no electron, not just plaintext, has images

I like OneNote. I had some annoyances with autocorrect being difficult to disable in some versions, but it's one of my favorites.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#173

Post by nytesky » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 4:53 PM UTC

ckcheng wrote: post #26

tptacek wrote: post #6

This is going to be one of those threads where everyone rattles off their own note-taking setup, which is great and all. So: There's a lot of things people tend to want from note-taking setups: easy entry, navigation and organization, wiki-like linkages, export to various formats, encryption. What I've found actually matters for my day-to-day and gets me to actually take lots of notes, though, is just (1) search and…

Exactly, I need to take lots of notes and beyond search and sync, I need it conveniently everywhere with me on all devices. That's why I use Google Keep --- which is pretty terrible... except it's free, it's everywhere there's a browser, there's an app for it on every phone/tablet, and it works offline when I sometimes don't have internet connection. Works ok since I write notes in plain text, with some markdown nota…

Yeah ubiquity of Keep makes it very sticky. Getting iCloud notes on a PC is a real pain and requires you have your phone most times (Apple browser logins seem to have much shorter persistence)

I use iA writer a lot, but would be happy with any iOS text editor, as I like keeping notes in plain text, and then iCloud Drive does my sync natively. On Mac I use TextEdit or vim.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#174

Post by something98 » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 4:58 PM UTC

1234fef wrote: post #92

something98 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having been making a go at several of the suggested applications, which all use MD, I’m also starting to like it less and less. I find the side-by-side panes of some just a hilariously stupid waste of space. And the editors that at least do live “previews” feel so janky when editing; watching pound signs appear and disappear as you move off a line, or having text shift around as bold and italics markers come and go.…

As a person who also hates the stupid split screen, I think you will like https://bangle.io , it is WYSIWYG local note taking app. It saves notes in markdown but provides you with a pretty interface. The goal of this project is to provide a nice interface like notion while keeping the data in users machine in a human readable format.

I'll check it out. Thank you.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#175

Post by ubermonkey » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:26 PM UTC

sandgiant wrote: post #38

tptacek wrote: post #6

This is going to be one of those threads where everyone rattles off their own note-taking setup, which is great and all. So: There's a lot of things people tend to want from note-taking setups: easy entry, navigation and organization, wiki-like linkages, export to various formats, encryption. What I've found actually matters for my day-to-day and gets me to actually take lots of notes, though, is just (1) search and…

After Evernote went Electron and stripped the context-feature, DevonThink won me over. I use it for its flexibility in indexing, file-like-organization, OCR, encryption and flexible synchronization. Also the devs are very respondant and I like not having to pay for a subscription.

I tried to use DT for years, and eventually just decided it was Not For Me.

It got so file-like that I realized I could get almost everything I liked about how it cataloged, say, PDFs by just putting the PDFs in a folder and using regular file system search. Plus the lack of mobile was a problem at the time. Have they fixed that?

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#176

Post by pps » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:26 PM UTC

ozzydave wrote: post #24

tptacek wrote: post #6

This is going to be one of those threads where everyone rattles off their own note-taking setup, which is great and all. So: There's a lot of things people tend to want from note-taking setups: easy entry, navigation and organization, wiki-like linkages, export to various formats, encryption. What I've found actually matters for my day-to-day and gets me to actually take lots of notes, though, is just (1) search and…

I really like Agenda app. Similar to Bear notes with two advantages- connecting notes to calendar entries is smart, it means you are organized with no effort, and create reminders in line in your notes.

Another option for mixing notes and calendar entries is https://noteplan.co/

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#177

Post by pps » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:32 PM UTC

crossroadsguy wrote: post #168

greymalik wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Table support is in their current beta version.

Ah, so the new version will not be the simple minimal app they are now I guess.

I'm 85% sure I read somewhere on their subreddit that they will keep Panda as it is now for people who prefer it that simple.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#178

Post by ubermonkey » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:44 PM UTC

ryeguy_24 wrote: post #108

The way I classify things is as follows: 1. Notes 2. Tasks These are not mutually exclusive. And the fact that they are not mutually exclusive is, in my opinion, one of the major obstacles in being able to develop a really good process for taking notes and then operating on those notes. I frankly don’t care much for any note software out there because the note taking part is generally easy so I just default to Apple…

The need to mingle notes and tasks, and then have something smart that would show me the todos in one list later, is what drove me to Orgmode.

I haven't seen this functionality satisfactorily implemented anywhere else.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#179

Post by ubermonkey » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

preek wrote: post #48

The article mentions Org mode a lot. If you want to try it, but are no Emacs user or also want to use it on mobile (iOS or Android), there is a FOSS solution called organice which I use daily for everything from notes to private and professional project management: https://github.com/200ok-ch/organice

Oh, wow, interesting idea. I'm definitely bookmarking this.

Re: Note Taking in 2021

#180

Post by ubermonkey » Thu, Jun 17, 2021, 5:47 PM UTC

Timothycquinn wrote: post #27

FWIW, I have used single panel outlines for years starting with Omni Outliner on my OSX 10.0.1 days. However, after switching off Mac, I've come to depended on Ecco Pro[1] which I presently use on Ubuntu/Gnome via Wine. Ecco Pro only has one level of undo but it just does just what is needed and I've never had it loose any data on me. It was last compiled in 1997 but there are ways to tweak it out for modern OS's. I…

Man, throwback! I loved Ecco back in the day. It was definitely the spiritual successor to the niche hit Lotus Agenda, which was unfortunately so weird that Lotus gave up and created Organizer instead. That was a shame, because Agenda was insanely powerful. I was really glad to see Ecco happen, and sadder still when I eventually had to move off it.