Yes, I know that the are dozens of notes apps. I’m looking for recommendations based on a few features that I like:
- nice design (including color coding)
- easy checklists
- sharing - this one is key. I use a shared shopping list and we both need to add and edit.
- pinning and archiving (hidden notes)
I don’t mind running it from my homelab server, but that is not a requirement. Does anyone use a notes app that you love? Let me know!
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I’m happy with standard notes. Very easy to use and you don’t need to sync files across devices yourself. I’m not sure if it’s possible to share the notes tho.
Results from me asking this 1Y ago: https://lemm.ee/post/4593760
Went with Joplin and using it since.
Results from the same question 1 month ago: https://lemm.ee/post/45943693
Thank you! This is very helpful. I didn’t see these but Lemmy search is sort of broken for me right now.
I’m using Quillpad
This is the best answer and should be much higher. It’s the closest thing to Google Keep with the features OP wants.
Does this reorganize the task list when checked or treat it as vanilla mark down?
It puts completed items at the bottom of the list, if I understand what you’re asking
That is thanks, have you tried the nexcloud support?
Yes, that’s how I’m using it. NextcloudPi on a Pi 4. It’s been working really well for me.
Thanks, I gave it a quick try, the only things missing from keep are a home screen widget and custom ordering of tiles, lots of promise
Yeah, it’s not perfect. I’ve noticed that when making a task list/checkbox note that you can’t delete the line. Sure you can go and edit the contents of that line, but even if you delete all text, the line with a checkbox remains. Kind of annoying, particularly when I accidentally create another checkbox and have nothing to put in it. it’s just an empty line and checkbox sitting there mocking me. You can still mark it complete of course, but it kinda makes my eye twitch. :)
if you’re comparing note apps and don’t want to try them all one by one like i did, somebody apparently tried them all and wrote reviews ☞https://www.noteapps.ca/
For note apps I can recommend:
- sharing - this one is key. I use a shared shopping list and we both need to add and edit.
i use and love notally but you can’t share/sync (export/import wouldn’t satisfy the above requirement)
I was using Joplin for a while… Self hosted their server. On two occasions it screwed up on me and wouldn’t load my folders… Luckily I had backups but it was still frustrating. I don’t recommend them purely because the notes are stored in a custom format instead of just plain text files.
My favorite way of doing notes now is with git, currently using a free private repo on gitlab.
Just clone the repo on whatever PC I need them and it has backups and version control.
Then use GitJournal on my phone.
It’s perfect for me. I love it.
Nice, I’ve been doing something similar, using the obsidian-git plug-in for Obsidian and the Working Copy app on iOS.
Obsidian is my front-end, and it saves the notes in markdown files in a git-synced folder on my computer.
The plug-in pushes and pulls automatically, and Working Copy does the same thing on iOS, just before opening the Obsidian app on iOS.
I had similar experiences with Joplin. Would randomly lose quite a lot of data, and exporting to other formats was a hassle. I also cannot recommend.
I also found a fork called NotallyX, which includes import functions from Keep and Evernote. Pretty useful for someone migrating.
- amount of backups to keep
also is a nice addition but i like the fact that notally is just 1.9mb. So i keep using notally and delete a dozen backups from time to time :/
yeah, just looking through the notes, it looks like both devs care a lot about their project and just have different visions for what a “Complete” notes app should look like. It’s nice to see, because sometimes when you see a fork of a project it’s because someone abandoned it or there is some kind of community drama, but that doesn’t seem to be the case afaik.
Why does Notally not have an Issue tracker?
Seems pretty much exactly like Nextcloud Notes but without sync and with image/audio. Wish the images could be inline instead of headers.
Carnet on Nextcloud is currently the “closest” I’ve found but it needs a ton of TLC. Sharing notes currently only works on the dev build. I keep telling myself I’ll fix it but can’t find the time. If anyone wants some open source contributions the maintainer has asked for help
I just use NextCloud Notes. Categories are just sub folders, so you can create a Shared category and just share it in Nextcloud.
I wish the web interface let you sort the sub categories both ways. I have a series of subcategories of Year/month that I’m using as a journal and the longer I keep writing, the further have to scroll down :/
+1 for notesnook, self hosting coming soon
🤔
No sharing in Notesnook
Joplin is my pick.
Upvotes because the devs are good. Sharing does not work well if at all though.
This is a very cool project! With a few minor developments this could meet my needs
Obsidian is amazing, though it isn’t FOSS but your notes are saved in Markdown, so even if something happens with the app, they will remain yours.
Another alternative may be Joplin and AnyType, but I think AnyType is also not 100% FOSS.
Logseq
How about LogSeq ?
Basically unmaintained at this point until they release the DB version “some day”. And you’re delusional if you think they can maintain both versions at the same time. They can’t even update the current production version that they already have without focusing all their efforts on a new app that hasn’t been released yet.
Am I crazy? I’m seeing a github page with commits from 6 days ago. When you unmaintained what do you mean, like no new features?
Almost all of those are for the database release, not the production release.
Even if they are for the current production release was last April. Considering the buggy mess their product is, that’s kind of unacceptable for an app that is supposed to hold your entire lifes data.
They’re adding a database to back it?
That’s off putting, I liked its simplicity, and it’s being open source.
https://discuss.logseq.com/t/why-the-database-version-and-how-its-going/26744
I get it. And I don’t necessarily disagree with them, but it gives me concerns over the long term viability of the project. If obsidian did blocks the same way logseq did I’d probably jump ship and use that, but you can’t really brain dump in obsidian the same way you can in logseq.
Same page as you. I found Obsidian but deferred to Logseq instead for two reasons:
- Open source
- The block editor
But seeing this post reaffirms I should find an alternative. They want collaborative features, etc. That roadmap is very different from what I was wanting out of a “second brain”.
I have already been considering switching back to Obsidian and pairing it with Quartz for publishing.
AnyType seemed close as well, but it has a ton of features I wouldn’t use and it’s not clear to me how I could generate a website from it.
https://github.com/usememos/memos
This has all of that.
Wow, this looks amazing. I’ll have to check it out to see how sharing/collaboration works though.
They make an account on your hosted service. Notes can be set private or public or workspace.
Log in with the default there.
Critically you can’t share to specific accounts, it’s private, completely public or all registered users. Also, sharing is read-only, no collaboration allowed. So sharing sort of yes, but no collaboration say on a shopping list.
Two users can collaborate on a workspace note.
Seems that in the latest prerelease builds that is indeed true, even checkboxes work now.
Joplin + Syncthing has been great for me. Sync across multiple devices with no third party in between. However the “sharing” in this context is limited to other installations of the entire db. To my knowledge, there’s no way to say “sync these notes with my wife, and these others with my phone only” etc.
Last i looked into it, joplin had a bug which ment syncthing didnt work . Can’t remember the details but the solution was pinning an old version.
I am much much happier with markor notes + syncthing.
Super sinple, 100 % foss, sync what you want .
I guess it’s been a while then. Syncthing works perfectly for me, with the official latest version in Arch, the older version in Debian, the flatpak on Ubuntu, and the forked version on Android, syncing all my Joplin data all over the place.
I don’t much care for the file format though. The appeal of Git Journal is strong.
Syncthing will be discontinued this month. https://forum.syncthing.net/t/discontinuing-syncthing-android/23002
Syncthing on Android will be discontinued, and there’s a fork already, which as I said above, I use.
Oh nice, thanks.
Anyone know of any that integrate with Google assistant? Such that I can use my voice to add items to a list? Currently using keep due to this
Oh, that is a really interesting question. I do think that there are some open source assistants that may offer some flexibility, but that’s not really how I personally use a phone so I wouldn’t have any answer. I found this article from a few years ago that seems to suggest it was and may be possible.
