With their recent update it seems they are on the last step to making their free version completely useless – are there any good alternatives out there? Preferably something that has a similar android app. I know I could use ssh+vi in a text file, but I’d prefer something a bit more streamlined
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Obsidian. Very simple, all functionality is free, offline, all notes are accessible on your PC, you don’t even need Obsidian to open them because they are in Markdown. Has tons of community plugins for every need, even a Notion-like tables plugin. There is an android app which looks fine but I don’t use it much so I can’t say anything about it. But since all your notes are offline you have to think of ways to sync them. There is a paid Obsidian sync which you dont have to use or you can sync with any other method (manually, github, syncthing, etc…)
Edit: Oops, just realized the post is in FOSS community and Obsidian doesn’t seem to be open source. Sorry! I’m not going to delete the comment though, maybe it’ll help someone
you don’t even need Obsidian to open them because they are in Markdown
This is crucial for me. I have existing sets of notes in Markdown and still want to edit in Vim or other editors, but sometimes in Obsidian too.
Thanks, I posted it here, because I didn’t know of any more fitting community, I’ll look into it!
You can try Foam as an open source Obsidian alternative. As far as I know, it only exists as an VSCode extension, but for me that works fine
I recommend silverbullet.md as someone else posted above.
Logseq is an open source alterative to Obsidian too
A bit of a self promo (I’m the main author), but you may also want to look at SilverBullet as alternative: https://silverbullet.md/
Bit more technical than EverNote. More like Obsidian, but 100% open source and self hosted.
I suspected the site was a demo of what the software LOOKED like, then I got to the part where y’all say it’s functional. That’s a REALLY cool way to do an intro!
I used to use evernote mainly to store OCRed pdfs with some metadata. Moved my workflow over to a self hosted paperless-ngx instance. I’ll never go back.
I’d like to do this too! Any idea how best to migrate my stuff from Evernote?
You can export notebooks directly from Evernote, and then some apps can import them from there. I know Joplin can but there are some others as well.
I used yarle to convert evernote exports to obsidian. The pdfs will be accessible in the filesystem then.
It’s not difficult to get the PDF’s onto the file system, you can just export them there.
What’s difficult is getting them imported with all the metadata they originally had into another system with the same preview and search capability as Evernote.
Obsidian doesn’t look great for dealing with PDF’s from what I can see. What’s your feeling, would it work well? Or is paperless-ngx somehow accessing them from obsidian?
I don’t understand why obsidian is involved if you access them with paperless-ngx.
My first idea was to use obsidian as note and pdf app. I did add some metadata to the notes, but I never used them - full text did it for me. Hence the obsidian path.
There are plugins for obsidian that allow ocr stuff, but I don’t use them. I kind of split my workflow.
It sounded like from your first post that you were using paperless-ngx for PDF’s now. Do you use it that way or something else?
Notes, todos, stuff -> obsidian
Pdfs -> paperless
😊
So any advice on migrating PDF’s from Evernote to paperless?
I’ve heard good things about logsec + Syncthing.
There are several that I’ve been using / trying out:
- Notion
- used to be good, but it’s becoming more and more bloated, and nowadays those AI command options seem to be cluttering the quick commands.
- It is freemium, and syncs with their servers.
- It has a really good table creation system, and the keyboard navigation flows really well.
- I stopped using it since it’s becoming slower and bloated, and migrated my language notes to Obsidian.
- Obsidian
- is very capable (except that it doesn’t a good WYSIWYG table creation / adjustment system),
- it has tons of community plugins, very fast, lightweight, and customizable.
- Completely free, but it does take some tinkering, and some parts do look kinda awful.
- If you’ve been taking long notes with markdown, then Obsidian will probably suit you.
- I have all my language notes written in Obsidian and synced to Github with a plugin.
- Anytype
- is the latest one I’m trying out. Still in alpha, version 0.32
- It is clunky at times, because the keyboard navigation is not well implemented, you still need to rely on mouse to select some sections.
- But it has a really interesting type / relation definition system, where you define an object type, e.g. Movie, and you can define templates, relation to other objects (e.g. relation to Directors, etc).
- I’m currently using it to plan my games / streaming backlog, it has a good table and data view system.
I believe all 3 of them have android apps.
- Notion
I use the Notes app of Nextcloud. It syncs flawlessly between Linux and Android. Of course with your own instance of Nextcloud, hosted or self-hosted, you get sooo much more.
I really, really like Joplin.
I had not heard of Joplin, thank you for mentioning it. Just installed to Android and OSX, syncs with Syncthing beautifully! I think I found my new note taking system.
I’m glad you like it! I had never heard of it either, until i went looking for free notes apps. Easily my favorite one I’ve used
I use emacs with org mode, and the orgzly android app, for my note taking. It fits my needs well enough, though the android app cant do all the fancy latex insertion emacs can.
Steep learning curve but fun to use once you got how it works.
I’m also looking for an alternative to Evernote since they jacked up their prices. My primary use is as a document store for OCR and indexing of scanned paperwork.
For general note taking I’m starting to use Logseq, but I don’t think that’s the right solution for long term storage, I have over 10 years of scanned documents I want to port across
Paperless-NGX seems to be the best option I found so far, but not installed it yet
Seems you started looking for an alternative just in time 😳👍
Great that I didn’t consider subscription for a second.
So many great alternatives, luckily! 😊
I personally love Logseq. I use syncthing to sync the files but they’re implementing their own syncing feature. Works really fantastic and is cross platform.
I second Logseq. FOSS, completely local, stores everything in text - works well with Git, lots of plugins - it’s almost perfect
I third logseq 😅
Has a (small) learning curve. But powerful once you learn it.
It takes a while to open the first time though.
Yes, It takes it’s time indexing the graph - and you have to re-index periodically if you want you queries and graph to be in shape. I have a pretty mature KB, and this process takes no more than a few seconds, so it’s fine.
Honestly, I love everything about it, except for the app itself. It ties me to the default editor, which is an Electron-based sluggish resource hog. I’d rather have some software scaffolding to work in an editor of my preference, but that is just me. I suspect most people in most use cases won’t find it as problematic.
Yes, in fact I was searching for any CLI/TUI app for editing Logseq’s files. I feel a Logseq LSP server might help.
I’ve been toying with the same idea. Having Logseq running in server mode + creating an LSP adapter should be doable.
I couldn’t deal with their electron desktop client, so I ended up with QOwnNotes. Gread QT app for fellow KDE enthusiasts
I don’t like electron either. Sadly I’m a GTK lover.
This is not at all what it’s meant for but I use Element messenger for this purpose. It’s on all my devices, it’s e2ee, it’s shareable if needs be. It’s also a damn fine messenger in its own right.
I have used Joplin for a good while. I self hosted a little docker server for sync and off I went. There are paid sync plans available though. Nowadays I’m lazy and use the notes of my Nextcloud instance most of the time.
Just adding: you can also sync Joplin through your Nextcloud instance, works well for me
Or if you have anything offering webdav, I’m syncing to my mailbox.org drive. I’m not sure if I’ll stick with Joplin, though, I’m not sure markdown is for me.
You can toggle the editor to be WYSIWYG only and then you won’t see Markdown source.
I don’t think you can do that on the Android app, though, can you? I don’t mind markdown as much on my laptop, but on the phone it’s a pain in the ass when I’m just trying to jot something down, or add to a list.
I thought you could but apparently not, unless I’m not seeing it. I was thinking of the desktop app on Linux/Windows/macOS.
It threw me off since it’s not just a plain text editor but renders some of the formatting even when editing markdown.
First off, Notion is vastly superior to Evernote in every way (IMO). They have super streamlined apps for both Android and iOS, and the learning curve is negligible. Fully accessible in any browser, too. Once mastered, Notion is ridiculously powerful, and their free account ridiculously generous.
That being said, I recently discovered Obsidian, and although I have big love for Notion, I don’t think I’ll be using it anymore.
Obsidian also has apps, both for mobile and (native) desktop (Mac, Win, Linux),
is open source(edit: my bad, not open source), and has a thriving plugin community on GitHub.The learning curve is steeper, and Obsidian is one of those things that’s so flexible that it’s borderline overwhelming, but if you can wrap your head around how you want to use it, make it suit your needs, it’s the absolute bee’s knees.
Personally, I use Obsidian on my Mac desktop, and sync my Vaults (basically just a specific folder on your HDD containing your notes (individual markdown.md files) and folders) with Google Drive. I then sync the changes to my Android phone using Autosync for Google Drive, where I use the native Obsidian app, and Google Drive syncs to my Chromebook where I run the Obsidian Linux client.
I can’t stress enough how much I love Obsidian, it’s truly been one of my top 3 new software revelations in the last 5 years (Raycast and Midjourney being the other two). Highly recommended ❤️
Edit: Sorry, just now noticed this was posted in FOSS, so my suggestions might not be valid. Just thought since you’re coming from Evernote, and there are fantastic, free alternatives, you might want to look into those 🙂 Both my recommendations have paid options (Obsidian offers paid sync, but is completely compatible with free alternatives), but both work amazingly without ever opening your wallet.
I tried Obsidian, but I’m building a meal planner and a workout planner in Notion and I just can’t imagine getting anywhere near this juice for my squeeze from Obsidian. I also live for the consistency between Windows and Android and the simple and clear notifications from my projects, tasks, and calendar on BOTH reliably.
Do I need to give Obsidian a 2nd look? Any resource you recommend for plug-ins or specific plug-ins? Thanks!
Honestly, that sounds like something you’re going to have a much better time doing in Notion 😅
Your use case is outside the type of thing I use Obsidian for (notes, brainstorms, longform/fiction writing, project development), so there might be plugins I don’t know about that will help you do what you’re describing, but then I’m not the right person to ask 😕
I’m not sure what type of functionality it is you want to end up with, but if Notion doesn’t get you there, my first thoughts would be to try Google Sheets (can do almost anything, but steep learning curve for advanced stuff), or maybe even Airtable (which I haven’t looked at since I found Notion, at least 5 years ago, so unsure how they’ve been developing).
Good luck with the project! 😃🤘
