Ask HN: What do you use for note-taking or as knowledge base?

13 points by cheesepaint 2 years ago | 20 comments

I went down the rabbit hole of digital notebooks, knowledge bases and co. After reading and trying a lot, I came to the idea of writing a blog article about the topic. For that, I would be thankful for some of your personal experiences and tips (or the reason why you avoid them all together). Originally I just wanted to find an open source alternative for onenote (with focus on the pen input and linux compatibility)... Thanks for your answers!

CrypticShift 2 years ago |

I've come to the conclusion that I need to loosen my grip. So basically, as long as I can export my data in an open-enough format, I will use anything I'm comfortable with and then I won't worry much about organizing my data. The two main reasons are:

- Most notes are ephemeral anyway. The other day, I found a box of folders from my 20s (a long time ago), and it was just a dusty "curiosity box". We change, and the world changes.

- LLMs are already at the level where you can literally just put all your digital stuff in and then have a usefull conversation with it. We just need better open integration, efficient local models...

My only rule for lesset structured data (= note-taking) is that the tool must support my "current" process of thought, not any hypothetical future need. I use outliners for that.

My only rule for the more structured data (= KM bases) is that I can potentially merge the data together (CSV will do) and use it in any interface I like (good filtering...)

g8oz 2 years ago |

Tried everything and ended up with silos of information every where. It kind of works at expense of order and sanity. In no particular order: Notion, OneNote, Markor (oss, Markdown,Android), Zettlr (oss,Markdown, desktop). Pocket and Firefox collections for bookmarks. Notepad++ projects full of Markdown files are used as well. One day I will unify them into one app to rule them all (yeah right). Different apps seem to lend themselves to different purposes: reference info, project planning, writing for others, diaries.

A few consistent themes are: - Markdown is important

- Syncing or at least access between devices is crucial - hence the OneNote and Notion. Love the Firefox collections and "send tab to device" feature

- any iOS use means that an open source unified solution will be well nigh impossible

BillyTheMage 2 years ago |

I keep absolutely everything in a single folder. Saved documents, images, movies, financial records, game saves, it doesn't matter. My hierarchical naming scheme takes care of organization. On the odd occasion I actually need a folder, I just append ".d" to the filename.

I use . as a hierarchy delimiter, so file extensions are just part of the hierarchy, and I can have multiple files with the same name except for the extension. For example, "film.spongebob.png" is a photo of spongebob, "film.spongebob.org" is a note about spongebob, and "film.spongebob.s1.e7.avi" is my favorite episode.

I use org-roam [1] for note-taking and task/time-management. I absolutely require a plain-text system so it either had to be markdown or org-mode. Emacs was the deciding factor, else I would have still been using Dendron [2]

If OneNote is your thing, I'd probably recommend Obsidian [3] over org-roam. Despite it being the greatest program ever created, Emacs is a lot to learn "just" for taking notes.

If you like VS Code, check out Dendron. It's the one that got me into more serious PKMS instead of just chucking notes in a folder all willy nilly.

- [1]: https://www.orgroam.com/

- [2]: https://www.dendron.so/

- [3]: https://obsidian.md/

rubymamis 2 years ago |

If I may promote my own note-taking app - Plume[1], is built on top of my previous open source and cross-platform note-taking app[2]. It will be available on Linux as well.

It allows you to easily write beautiful notes, and add complex blocks (such as a Kanban board, images, columns, etc). What's unique about it is that:

1. It's fast, really fast for a complex block editor. Built with Qt C++ and QML it's actually faster than comparable native apps.

2. Each note is just a simple plaintext in the underlying data (although currently stored in a database, but in a future update we'll convert the database to an arbitrary folder).

So you can create beautiful and advanced notes easily, in a non-proprietary format (when that future update arrives). All while using a resource efficient and fast software that is cross-platform.

[1] https://www.get-plume.com/

[2] https://www.get-notes.com/

syndicatedjelly 2 years ago |

Am I the only one who doesn't use a specific note-taking app? What am I missing? If I need to write something down, I just...write it down wherever is convenient. Torn piece of notebook paper, sticky note, markdown file, Apple Notes, whatever. And then refer to it if I need it. I commit to memory anything that's very important to remember.

It sounds like a lot of people detail each and every day, and I just don't understand the point. I'm also someone who enjoys writing a lot, but those are usually about specific topics. Not just my life ad-nauseam. It sounds like a chore to do all the things people in this thread are talking about

I've tried using programs like OneNote or Obsidian, and found that I configure it, use it once, and then literally never open the application again. Whatever I wrote was not important enough to ever read again for some reason.

bencelaszlo 2 years ago | |

> Am I the only one who doesn't use a specific note-taking app? What am I missing? If I need to write something down, I just...write it down wherever is convenient. Torn piece of notebook paper, sticky note, markdown file, Apple Notes, whatever. And then refer to it if I need it.

If you actually find them later, that's great. But if you have to return to a context a few months later, having only one place to look into helps a lot. I'm not writing a journal though it's more like a "start again guide" to various topics.

syndicatedjelly 2 years ago | | |

That's fair, I guess I do that too. For hardware projects, i put them in a clear plastic box and write on a piece of paper the state of the project, and then for software I usually have a markdown file with relevant notes about the project. For me, proximity to the project is more important than centralization - I guess i use a decentralized note-taking approach

joegahona 2 years ago |

Noteplan [1] has stuck for at least 3 years now. I like that in addition to old-school notes pages, each day has its own page. I capture notes and to-dos when I'm in meetings, and it has a separate view that will aggregate all your to-dos onto the same screen, no matter what day they appeared on. That might be available in many note-taking apps now, but when I converted to Noteplan, I couldn't find that feature anywhere. I really wanted something that combined to-dos and notes into the same software.

Note-taking apps are a really crowded space and there are die-hards in every camp. It sounds trite, but I'm convinced the best one is the one that sticks and that you actually use.

[1] https://noteplan.co/

I_am_tiberius 2 years ago | |

Is it e2e encrypted?

_benj 2 years ago |

It might sounds old and something that somebody always says, but emacs org mode is absolutely fantastic!!

I picked it up just a few days ago because I needed to keep notes, code, links, tables… just general information as I worked on projects.

I installed doom emacs because I just wanted some defaults that worked ok, watched a few YouTube videos, it took me a day to pick it up and now I’m totally in love with it!

The tables are awesome, the links even better, being able to move whole blocks of text, collapse sections, mark todos, is awesome!

Don’t worry about “learning” emacs or org mode, just watch some videos to get an idea of what you can do and then just pick what you need.

I’ve tried emacs multiple times in the last decade and it never stuck, but org mode is absolutely fantastic!

bencelaszlo 2 years ago |

Joplin, an open source, extendable, Markdown-based hierarchical note-taking app: https://joplinapp.org/

It lets you choose a synchronization backend, offers applications for every major desktop and mobile OS (also has a terminal version). You can create notebooks and subnotebooks to organize your notes. You can also add tags for better search experience. I created notebooks for specific domains (work-related, home improvement, etc.) and also keep a "temp" for quick notes and W.I.P. snippets.

Its only con that it uses Electron on desktop which causes relatively slow start of the application.

drakonka 2 years ago |

I've been using Logseq. My notes are quite disorganized - I often just dump some thought or link in there. If I care enough I tag it to make it easily findable. Many notes I take are never revisited, but that's okay. I feel like Logseq works with the chaos - when I don't care about a note it lets it get lots, but when I really need to find something I usually can. Its extensibility satisfies my occasional burst of "productivity procrastination", where I can sit and fiddle with different plugins or write my own until I get bored.

scarlehoff 2 years ago |

I use this https://www.styluslabs.com/ since it is the only thing that works (offline) in both Linux and ipad for handwritten notes.

It's not as good as One Note but it the best I was able to find. If you have some better suggestion I'm all hears!

geekodour 2 years ago |

shameless selfplug[0] but I've documented my notetaking process here. I don't follow it religiously but it's pretty much it, recently have been making more use of local llms to summarize things/reformat into forms that are useful but tedious to create manually etc. (which is not mentioned there in the linked page)

i am planning to add semantic search over my wiki and other places. Another major notetaking tool for me is pictures and screenshots, I've to figure out a way to make a better way to organize/search them in a more meaningful way

0: https://geekodour.org/docs/documents/notetaking/

rtcoms 2 years ago |

Chrome extension: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/my-notes/lkeeogfaie...

k1w1 2 years ago |

https://www.aha.io/notebooks/overview

gaws 2 years ago |

Obsidian

/thread

mikewarot 2 years ago |

I use WikidPad, I used to love the outline mode of Microsoft Word when I was in the corporate world.

revskill 2 years ago |

Notion served me well.

tracer4201 2 years ago |

Japanese notebooks and ball point pens. Dedicated notebook for individual projects. Daily planner.

If I really want to focus and stay organized, nothing beats pen and paper. I’ve tried out note taking apps, writing on my iPad, using my husband’s remarkable tablet, and Obsidian. It’s fun and interesting at first but doesn’t scale. I will however type some notes up, when needed, in Obsidian just for the search functionality. I’m still pen and paper first.