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Why I Like Obsidian

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Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#71

Post by [deleted] »

skinnyarms wrote: post #5
jimmytucson wrote: post #2

> allows structure to grow organically > powerful feature ... Internal Links. > plain text files Well, they're not _plain_ text - there is some markup. So that invites the question - why not HyperText Markup Language? Doesn't HTML have all of these features - hyperlinks, folder structures, "plain" text? Isn't HTML also future proof? It's been around long enough. And doesn't it also work offline? There's a bunch of di…

Markdown is so much easier to read and maintain in its raw form. I can't imagine trying to take meeting notes in html. ``` - [ ] Item 1 - [ ] Item 2 ``` ``` Item 1 Item 2 ```

[deleted]

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#72

Post by kuter »

The deal breaker with obsidian for me is that it is not opensource. It's great that it's at least using a markdown derivative format.

I am using Emacs Org Mode and quite happy with it. You can link different files, include images, embed and view LaTeX, encrypt your notes with GPG and much more. I think it will stand the test of time better than Obsidian which is something I care a lot for note taking and journaling.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#73

Post by brightball »

hoherd wrote: post #69

I was unaware of this until a few weeks ago, so I'd like to raise awareness for anybody who it affects: Obsidian is not FOSS, and purchasing a license is required for any work that generates revenue at a for-profit company of 2 or more people. https://obsidian.md/license Obsidian looks awesome to me, and for a long time I've been thinking about adopting it, but this licensing issue caused me to back away and look for…

The big win for Obsidian here is that everything is just saved as markdown, so you're not locked in even with their license.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#74

Post by jpgvm »

I picked up Obsidian after reading a post by the CEO here. Good leadership is usually a sign of a good product and I wasn't disappointed.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#76

Post by chrisweekly »

jimmytucson wrote: post #49
mdhb wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re getting smashed for no particularly good reason in my opinion. I am in the camp if I like the idea of Obsidian but I have a bunch of other stuff I want to include and do stuff with like JSON-LD data for example. But the idea of writing raw HTML is in fact a huge pain in the ass as everyone was all too eager to point out here. We have had markdown to HTML converters and visual editing experiences for a long tim…

Yeah, clearly I touched a nerve :) But I still don't know what Obsidian gives you besides letting you write in Markdown instead of HTML. And that is basically a Markdown to HTML converter, as you pointed out.

It's hard to overstate the flowstate Obsidian enables with live / wysiwyg editor view -- enjoy the clean look of rendered HTML while typing simple markdown and kbd shortcuts -- "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts". There are many other reasons I love Obsidian, but most of all it's the core function -- the editor interface, atop my local, private markdown files.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#77

Post by pantulis »

lawgimenez wrote: post #70
Multicomp wrote: post #47

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on your favorite notetaking app OP, it's more than I've done for mine. I'm glad it works for you, the in-between applications trying to do notetaking is a pain. I settled on OneNote because I'm always trying to capture context with my notes, codify my knowledge. Usually that means screenshots, handwriting, file copies, rarely video or audio embeddings. I'm not going to try to convince…

Speaking of boring, my entire life runs on Apple Notes. Everything to-dos, from family, kids, work, car, etc. I am just not sure how to migrate all of my 2,000 plus notes on to a new system. Plus with limited mobile data signal, I’m not sure if apps like Obsidian will work.

People have reported success using Exporter, which is reasonably priced.

http://falcon.star-lord.me/exporter

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#78

Post by FredPret »

Multicomp wrote: post #47

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on your favorite notetaking app OP, it's more than I've done for mine. I'm glad it works for you, the in-between applications trying to do notetaking is a pain. I settled on OneNote because I'm always trying to capture context with my notes, codify my knowledge. Usually that means screenshots, handwriting, file copies, rarely video or audio embeddings. I'm not going to try to convince…

I once had a job where I needed tons of notes on hundreds of clients and dozens of subjects. Detailed technical notes with screenshots and code snippets and names and birthdays and to-do lists.

I used OneNote. It worked brilliantly.

Until my notebook file corrupted.

Obsidian does the same job, but I miss the tabs. At least it’s all text files - no proprietary files to corrupt.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#79

Post by klum »

dustincoates wrote: post #41

I like Obsidian, too, having recently switched over from 9 years of OneNote (the fact that there's a tool to import my OneNote notes helped a lot). The most important tip for getting started with Obsidian, in my mind, is to absolutely ignore all of the Obsidian "power users." I'm 99% convinced that no one actually uses zettelkasten seriously, but even if so, it's overkill for when you're just checking out the app. An…

Agreed on the power-user stuff and the courses. I use Obsidian in a simple way, but it's nice that the extensibility and the community is there.

Unlike VS Code, Obsidian is (for me) an actual example of an Electron app that feels fast. The quick open/command palette features are more responsive than similar features in native Mac apps I've tried.

As mentioned elsewhere, users frequently ask for Obsidian to be open source, but the fully transferrable file format is enough for me. I don't think most of those drive-by open-source commenters have thought about the work that goes into running an open-source project.

In other words, on some theoretical plane I'd like Obsidian to be an open-source native app, but in reality those things haven't bothered me at all. The app is as simple as I want it to be, as complex as I need it to be, and it's regularly improved in a thoughtful way.

Re: Why I Like Obsidian

#80

Post by packetlost »

dustincoates wrote: post #41

I like Obsidian, too, having recently switched over from 9 years of OneNote (the fact that there's a tool to import my OneNote notes helped a lot). The most important tip for getting started with Obsidian, in my mind, is to absolutely ignore all of the Obsidian "power users." I'm 99% convinced that no one actually uses zettelkasten seriously, but even if so, it's overkill for when you're just checking out the app. An…

You definitely can't just jump into zettelkasten, but it is actually used in various modified forms. I've been doing so for years and know of a number of others that do as well.
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