There are a ton of tools like Notion, Obsidian, Logseq, etc. that are all focused on primarily text/document first.
I've been spending a lot of time doing both design work and doing more creative/artistic fun stuff, but I also do a lot of reading and note taking and am hoping to find a tool that can bring all of this into one tool.
There are a lot of visual infinite canvas type tools like Miro, Milanote, Muse, etc. that are great for dumping images, doodling on the canvas, and organizing things however you want.
And there seem to be some tools somewhere in the middle, like Scrintal (terrible name lol) and Heptabase. There are some others, though they seem fairly anemic in terms of features and are more just another notion-like tool but you can put the notes on a canvas.
I guess the short of it is that I don't know exactly what I'm looking for and I'm hoping that some others here have found a nice solution for their own note taking/knowledge dumping which works in a visual way."},"title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Ask HN: Do you have a visual note taking app you enjoy?"}},"_tags":["story","author_dinkleberg","story_40661049","ask_hn"],"author":"dinkleberg","children":[40661649,40662342,40662775,40662936,40666348,40669384,40672500,40673743,40697636,40700042,40709991],"created_at":"2024-06-12T18:03:59Z","created_at_i":1718215439,"num_comments":15,"objectID":"40661049","points":17,"story_id":40661049,"story_text":"Have you found a visual note taking app that you actually enjoy using?
There are a ton of tools like Notion, Obsidian, Logseq, etc. that are all focused on primarily text/document first.
I've been spending a lot of time doing both design work and doing more creative/artistic fun stuff, but I also do a lot of reading and note taking and am hoping to find a tool that can bring all of this into one tool.
There are a lot of visual infinite canvas type tools like Miro, Milanote, Muse, etc. that are great for dumping images, doodling on the canvas, and organizing things however you want.
And there seem to be some tools somewhere in the middle, like Scrintal (terrible name lol) and Heptabase. There are some others, though they seem fairly anemic in terms of features and are more just another notion-like tool but you can put the notes on a canvas.
I guess the short of it is that I don't know exactly what I'm looking for and I'm hoping that some others here have found a nice solution for their own note taking/knowledge dumping which works in a visual way.","title":"Ask HN: Do you have a visual note taking app you enjoy?","updated_at":"2024-09-20T17:16:24Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"whacked_new"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I agree, it's an awesome concept in principle (and Girba is graciously welcoming people in discord). Working with an agent in GT, the agent will just look at the data and figure out how to express it in the graphical framework.
But in practicality, at least at this point, bb wins out by sheer expansiveness of ecosystem. I was working on a mishmash of an editor interface that combined obsidian with heptabase, directly in GT. It kind of worked. And the amazing thing is, everything has just a single representation: window positions displayed as text automatically have 2 way bindings across widgets, because they are the same data. But even with agents doing everything, 2 things creep up.
First is in JS/TS, all these binding problems are solved 1000x already. You can fake shared memory with callbacks and the agent won't lose track. In GT you move the cursor around, and have to decide at what point do you convert a widget representation to source representation, and when to restore the widget: is it a delay? is it after changing lines? is it after you move off the text? before or after the whitespace? There's a package for that somewhere in npm that answered all these questions, and it has tables, and it's performant. It doesn't do the 2% stuff that GT does using its magical shared memory representation (which also makes TS->smalltalk porting not straightforward), but you can still tape over it with sheer optimized code.
The second thing is that GT got really slow with all the data structure re-interpreting and rerendering. As "dirty" as bb is in reloading dynamic code, the runtimes are so optimized, I wanted the markdown nodes to be GPU-accelerated in bb, and it turns out they already were."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Pharo 14"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://pharo.org/news/2026-10-26-Pharo14Release.html"}},"_tags":["comment","author_whacked_new","story_50241925"],"author":"whacked_new","children":[50250471,50255753],"comment_text":"I agree, it's an awesome concept in principle (and Girba is graciously welcoming people in discord). Working with an agent in GT, the agent will just look at the data and figure out how to express it in the graphical framework.
But in practicality, at least at this point, bb wins out by sheer expansiveness of ecosystem. I was working on a mishmash of an editor interface that combined obsidian with heptabase, directly in GT. It kind of worked. And the amazing thing is, everything has just a single representation: window positions displayed as text automatically have 2 way bindings across widgets, because they are the same data. But even with agents doing everything, 2 things creep up.
First is in JS/TS, all these binding problems are solved 1000x already. You can fake shared memory with callbacks and the agent won't lose track. In GT you move the cursor around, and have to decide at what point do you convert a widget representation to source representation, and when to restore the widget: is it a delay? is it after changing lines? is it after you move off the text? before or after the whitespace? There's a package for that somewhere in npm that answered all these questions, and it has tables, and it's performant. It doesn't do the 2% stuff that GT does using its magical shared memory representation (which also makes TS->smalltalk porting not straightforward), but you can still tape over it with sheer optimized code.
The second thing is that GT got really slow with all the data structure re-interpreting and rerendering. As "dirty" as bb is in reloading dynamic code, the runtimes are so optimized, I wanted the markdown nodes to be GPU-accelerated in bb, and it turns out they already were.","created_at":"2026-10-26T18:47:33Z","created_at_i":1793040453,"objectID":"50248950","parent_id":50247948,"story_id":50241925,"story_title":"Pharo 14","story_url":"https://pharo.org/news/2026-10-26-Pharo14Release.html","updated_at":"2026-10-28T11:55:40Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"threecheese"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"Have you seen the Haystack editor? Addresses some of this: https://github.com/haystackeditor/haystack-editor
I am interested in \u201cnode-based\u201d design tools and libraries, given the convergence of editors and whiteboards within the knowledge management domain (Obsidian canvas, Heptabase), and they are encountering the kinds of issues you noted. The generative AI boom has been pushing this along very quickly, by improving and creating libraries to support tools like ComfyUI, DAG visualizers, and knowledge graphs; these solutions being so \u201cclose to the code\u201d, I am hopeful they\u2019ll be solved."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Nodezator is a generalist Python node editor"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://github.com/IndiePython/nodezator"}},"_tags":["comment","author_threecheese","story_42274399"],"author":"threecheese","children":[42281656,42283160],"comment_text":"Have you seen the Haystack editor? Addresses some of this: https://github.com/haystackeditor/haystack-editor
I am interested in \u201cnode-based\u201d design tools and libraries, given the convergence of editors and whiteboards within the knowledge management domain (Obsidian canvas, Heptabase), and they are encountering the kinds of issues you noted. The generative AI boom has been pushing this along very quickly, by improving and creating libraries to support tools like ComfyUI, DAG visualizers, and knowledge graphs; these solutions being so \u201cclose to the code\u201d, I am hopeful they\u2019ll be solved.","created_at":"2024-11-30T13:26:18Z","created_at_i":1732973178,"objectID":"42281491","parent_id":42281095,"story_id":42274399,"story_title":"Nodezator is a generalist Python node editor","story_url":"https://github.com/IndiePython/nodezator","updated_at":"2024-11-30T23:18:48Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"threecheese"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"This is great and I can\u2019t wait to try it. I\u2019ve been coding for a few decades, and have always been good at \u201ckeeping the program in my head\u201d. However, in life I am very bad at this and have failed at just about everything that\u2019s not programming, and based on a recent diagnosis I\u2019ve learned a lot about ADHD, autism, and \u201cvisual learners\u201d for whom abstract mental models are difficult to internalize without some visual anchor. \nAnyway, this has led me to use more visual tools - like Miro and Heptabase - and the lessened cognitive load is nothing less than stunning. I hope this model of human/machine interface is beneficial to everyone, and not just those who are broken, but coming from one of the latter I appreciate what you are doing here."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Launch HN: Haystack (YC S24) \u2013 Visualize and edit code on an infinite canvas"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://github.com/haystackeditor/haystack-editor"}},"_tags":["comment","author_threecheese","story_41648564"],"author":"threecheese","children":[41651549],"comment_text":"This is great and I can\u2019t wait to try it. I\u2019ve been coding for a few decades, and have always been good at \u201ckeeping the program in my head\u201d. However, in life I am very bad at this and have failed at just about everything that\u2019s not programming, and based on a recent diagnosis I\u2019ve learned a lot about ADHD, autism, and \u201cvisual learners\u201d for whom abstract mental models are difficult to internalize without some visual anchor. \nAnyway, this has led me to use more visual tools - like Miro and Heptabase - and the lessened cognitive load is nothing less than stunning. I hope this model of human/machine interface is beneficial to everyone, and not just those who are broken, but coming from one of the latter I appreciate what you are doing here.","created_at":"2024-09-25T20:19:48Z","created_at_i":1727295588,"objectID":"41651431","parent_id":41648564,"story_id":41648564,"story_title":"Launch HN: Haystack (YC S24) \u2013 Visualize and edit code on an infinite canvas","story_url":"https://github.com/haystackeditor/haystack-editor","updated_at":"2024-09-26T16:04:09Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"threecheese"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I desperately want this project to succeed. I\u2019ve made several attempts to use it to replace some other tooling, and feel like it is always \u201cnearly there\u201d. As someone with \u201cbrain problems\u201d (neurodivergent being a dirty word), I have found that a visual component for my notes really helps with recall, and there are a few commercial products trying to fill this niche like Heptabase, Scrintal, and Muse (which I also hope succeed).
Is anyone using Affine and can share some thoughts?"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Show HN: AFFiNE-An open source alternative to Notion&Miro with AI"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://affine.pro/ai"}},"_tags":["comment","author_threecheese","story_41530387"],"author":"threecheese","comment_text":"I desperately want this project to succeed. I\u2019ve made several attempts to use it to replace some other tooling, and feel like it is always \u201cnearly there\u201d. As someone with \u201cbrain problems\u201d (neurodivergent being a dirty word), I have found that a visual component for my notes really helps with recall, and there are a few commercial products trying to fill this niche like Heptabase, Scrintal, and Muse (which I also hope succeed).
Is anyone using Affine and can share some thoughts?","created_at":"2024-09-14T20:19:41Z","created_at_i":1726345181,"objectID":"41542532","parent_id":41530387,"story_id":41530387,"story_title":"Show HN: AFFiNE-An open source alternative to Notion&Miro with AI","story_url":"https://affine.pro/ai","updated_at":"2025-12-14T00:51:10Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"dragonhuang"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"Have you tried Heptabase? (https://heptabase.com/)"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Sioyek is a PDF viewer with a focus on textbooks and research papers"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek"}},"_tags":["comment","author_dragonhuang","story_40313143"],"author":"dragonhuang","children":[40315371],"comment_text":"Have you tried Heptabase? (https://heptabase.com/)","created_at":"2024-05-10T03:40:47Z","created_at_i":1715312447,"objectID":"40315316","parent_id":40315212,"story_id":40313143,"story_title":"Sioyek is a PDF viewer with a focus on textbooks and research papers","story_url":"https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek","updated_at":"2024-09-20T16:59:43Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"entherhe"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I always feel like whiteboarding & concept mapping is better when it comes to generative AI, especially when it comes to the nature that we are chat in a "multimodal way" these days -- just think of old plain text SMS compared to mems links rich-text powered IM tools nowadays.
Congrats! you may also check flowith and ai.affine.pro for similar selling points.
Also, heptabase is good and they will definitely make a ai version soon or later."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Show HN: I built a non-linear UI for ChatGPT"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://www.grafychat.com"}},"_tags":["comment","author_entherhe","story_40300126"],"author":"entherhe","comment_text":"I always feel like whiteboarding & concept mapping is better when it comes to generative AI, especially when it comes to the nature that we are chat in a "multimodal way" these days -- just think of old plain text SMS compared to mems links rich-text powered IM tools nowadays.
Congrats! you may also check flowith and ai.affine.pro for similar selling points.
Also, heptabase is good and they will definitely make a ai version soon or later.","created_at":"2024-05-08T17:16:38Z","created_at_i":1715188598,"objectID":"40300555","parent_id":40300126,"story_id":40300126,"story_title":"Show HN: I built a non-linear UI for ChatGPT","story_url":"https://www.grafychat.com","updated_at":"2024-09-20T16:57:31Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"johnny1002"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":true,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"heptabase"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Ask HN: Seamless sync of notes between Linux, macOS, iOS"}},"_tags":["comment","author_johnny1002","story_36296951"],"author":"johnny1002","comment_text":"heptabase","created_at":"2023-06-13T11:50:41Z","created_at_i":1686657041,"objectID":"36308857","parent_id":36296951,"story_id":36296951,"story_title":"Ask HN: Seamless sync of notes between Linux, macOS, iOS","updated_at":"2024-09-20T14:19:44Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"gustavotoyota"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"In my mind the apps most similar to DeepNotes are Heptabase, Obsidian, Roam Research, and Notion. Maybe put Miro, Whimsical and Clover in that list.
Comparing against these I would say the main differences are security, user-designed navigation, spatiality and simplicity:
- Security (and privacy): As far as I know, none of the apps above have end-to-end encryption like DeepNotes. DeepNotes is more fitting for you if you value security and privacy.
- User-designed navigation: As far as I know, all these apps lock your pages into a tree index structure for page navigation. In DeepNotes the user creates their own page navigation by placing links to pages in 2D instead of organizing their pages in a tree structure.
- Spatiality: This is the ability to move notes in 2D. This is one important defining feature which some of these apps don't have. At least the most popular, Notion, doesn't. Obsidian recently added a canvas feature though.
- Simplicity: DeepNotes is just notes and arrows inside linkable pages. Looking at Heptabase and Notion, for example, they keep adding features like databases, PDF file reading, and AI integration that make the app more complex, and the app becomes bloated."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"DeepNotes \u2013 Visual Note-Taking for Deeply Interconnected Ideas"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://deepnotes.app/"}},"_tags":["comment","author_gustavotoyota","story_35746172"],"author":"gustavotoyota","comment_text":"In my mind the apps most similar to DeepNotes are Heptabase, Obsidian, Roam Research, and Notion. Maybe put Miro, Whimsical and Clover in that list.
Comparing against these I would say the main differences are security, user-designed navigation, spatiality and simplicity:
- Security (and privacy): As far as I know, none of the apps above have end-to-end encryption like DeepNotes. DeepNotes is more fitting for you if you value security and privacy.
- User-designed navigation: As far as I know, all these apps lock your pages into a tree index structure for page navigation. In DeepNotes the user creates their own page navigation by placing links to pages in 2D instead of organizing their pages in a tree structure.
- Spatiality: This is the ability to move notes in 2D. This is one important defining feature which some of these apps don't have. At least the most popular, Notion, doesn't. Obsidian recently added a canvas feature though.
- Simplicity: DeepNotes is just notes and arrows inside linkable pages. Looking at Heptabase and Notion, for example, they keep adding features like databases, PDF file reading, and AI integration that make the app more complex, and the app becomes bloated.","created_at":"2023-04-28T21:08:03Z","created_at_i":1682716083,"objectID":"35747121","parent_id":35746762,"story_id":35746172,"story_title":"DeepNotes \u2013 Visual Note-Taking for Deeply Interconnected Ideas","story_url":"https://deepnotes.app/","updated_at":"2024-09-20T14:00:00Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"pps"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"museapp.com works like that. Also heptabase.com and many others https://infinitecanvas.tools/"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Show HN: Obsidian Canvas \u2013 An infinite space for your ideas"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://obsidian.md/canvas"}},"_tags":["comment","author_pps","story_34066824"],"author":"pps","comment_text":"museapp.com works like that. Also heptabase.com and many others https://infinitecanvas.tools/","created_at":"2022-12-20T15:35:35Z","created_at_i":1671550535,"objectID":"34067319","parent_id":34067139,"story_id":34066824,"story_title":"Show HN: Obsidian Canvas \u2013 An infinite space for your ideas","story_url":"https://obsidian.md/canvas","updated_at":"2024-09-20T12:53:35Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"edmundsauto"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I followed a similar path until I discovered Heptabase. Focused on speed like Obsidian, but the solo dev pushes out new features at an insane pace. They do this by focusing, so you won\u2019t see a laundry list of features, and it\u2019s pay only but well worth the money.
Finding your note taking app is like finding sobriety. Some apps work for some people but any given app is unlikely to be \u201cthe one\u201d. My strategy was to just keep trying them until one sticks, because I know note taking is crucial for my success."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Why Evernote failed to realize its potential (2021)"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://nira.com/evernote-history/"}},"_tags":["comment","author_edmundsauto","story_33626047"],"author":"edmundsauto","comment_text":"I followed a similar path until I discovered Heptabase. Focused on speed like Obsidian, but the solo dev pushes out new features at an insane pace. They do this by focusing, so you won\u2019t see a laundry list of features, and it\u2019s pay only but well worth the money.
Finding your note taking app is like finding sobriety. Some apps work for some people but any given app is unlikely to be \u201cthe one\u201d. My strategy was to just keep trying them until one sticks, because I know note taking is crucial for my success.","created_at":"2022-11-16T17:52:55Z","created_at_i":1668621175,"objectID":"33627409","parent_id":33627000,"story_id":33626047,"story_title":"Why Evernote failed to realize its potential (2021)","story_url":"https://nira.com/evernote-history/","updated_at":"2024-09-20T12:35:12Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"labrador"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I'm currently investigating Heptabase which looks like it has a lot of what I need
https://heptabase.com/"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"What do you use for knowledge management?"}},"_tags":["comment","author_labrador","story_33240880"],"author":"labrador","comment_text":"I'm currently investigating Heptabase which looks like it has a lot of what I need
https://heptabase.com/","created_at":"2022-10-17T23:37:36Z","created_at_i":1666049856,"objectID":"33241025","parent_id":33240880,"story_id":33240880,"story_title":"What do you use for knowledge management?","updated_at":"2024-09-20T12:16:00Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"cliff_badger"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"Take a look at https://heptabase.com/. It may help you consolidate... (it's in an beta state, but getting updated weekly.)"},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Logseq: Privacy-First, Joyful Platform for Knowledge Management"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://logseq.com/?"}},"_tags":["comment","author_cliff_badger","story_33218561"],"author":"cliff_badger","children":[33242779],"comment_text":"Take a look at https://heptabase.com/. It may help you consolidate... (it's in an beta state, but getting updated weekly.)","created_at":"2022-10-17T14:11:55Z","created_at_i":1666015915,"objectID":"33233740","parent_id":33222522,"story_id":33218561,"story_title":"Logseq: Privacy-First, Joyful Platform for Knowledge Management","story_url":"https://logseq.com/?","updated_at":"2024-09-20T12:15:08Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"labrador"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"I'm thinking of a hyperlinked local site like HyperCard but with the ability to view interconnect pages merged onto one large page. In other words, adding more views than a traditional hyperlinked system offers.
Heptabase may have what I am looking for:
There's a lot of interesting ideas floating around out there:
Xanadu Hypertext Documents
https://sentido-labs.com/en/library/201904240732/Xanadu%20Hy..."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"How can we develop transformative tools for thought? (2019) [pdf]"},"story_url":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"https://numinous.productions/ttft/print/TTFT.pdf"}},"_tags":["comment","author_labrador","story_32535942"],"author":"labrador","comment_text":"I'm thinking of a hyperlinked local site like HyperCard but with the ability to view interconnect pages merged onto one large page. In other words, adding more views than a traditional hyperlinked system offers.
Heptabase may have what I am looking for:
There's a lot of interesting ideas floating around out there:
Xanadu Hypertext Documents
https://sentido-labs.com/en/library/201904240732/Xanadu%20Hy...","created_at":"2022-08-21T20:00:47Z","created_at_i":1661112047,"objectID":"32543855","parent_id":32540491,"story_id":32535942,"story_title":"How can we develop transformative tools for thought? (2019) [pdf]","story_url":"https://numinous.productions/ttft/print/TTFT.pdf","updated_at":"2024-09-20T11:51:01Z"},{"_highlightResult":{"author":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"graboid"},"comment_text":{"fullyHighlighted":false,"matchLevel":"full","matchedWords":["heptabase"],"value":"In recent years, many tools have been created in the note-taking space. They often market themselves as something like "personal knowledge management tools", "Zettelkasten" or "second brain". \nThere are just so many solutions now (and it seems like every week someone develops a new one). I keep a list where I note down solutions I see mentioned. In case you are still in search of a tool, here is a short extract containing some of the more popular tools from my note:
Obsidian, logseq, roam, foam, org mode, notion, remnote, evernote, dendron, zettlr, tiddlywiki, joplin, devonthink, thebrain, heptabase, scrintal, ...\nMy advice would be:
1. pick something that works outside the browser
2. pick something that you can sync, and that has a mobile solution for quick notes on-the-go
3. pick something that works on a "future-proof" plain-text format, e.g. .txt files or .md
4. some tools offer spaced repetition integration, either as core functionality, as plugin, or by syncing to a dedicated SRS app like Anki. If you find a way to frictionlessly create SR cards in your notes, that can be a nice way of keeping some knowledge "cached"
5. keep it simple in general, don't rely too much on specific tools or workflows. they will all cease to work/go out of business at some point.
6. If you are going with any solution that operates on a local folder of .md/.txt/.org files, a nice goodie is that you can actually version your notes with git."},"story_title":{"matchLevel":"none","matchedWords":[],"value":"Ask HN: What is a sustainable methodology for taking notes of your learning?"}},"_tags":["comment","author_graboid","story_32211734"],"author":"graboid","comment_text":"In recent years, many tools have been created in the note-taking space. They often market themselves as something like "personal knowledge management tools", "Zettelkasten" or "second brain". \nThere are just so many solutions now (and it seems like every week someone develops a new one). I keep a list where I note down solutions I see mentioned. In case you are still in search of a tool, here is a short extract containing some of the more popular tools from my note:
Obsidian, logseq, roam, foam, org mode, notion, remnote, evernote, dendron, zettlr, tiddlywiki, joplin, devonthink, thebrain, heptabase, scrintal, ...\nMy advice would be:
1. pick something that works outside the browser
2. pick something that you can sync, and that has a mobile solution for quick notes on-the-go
3. pick something that works on a "future-proof" plain-text format, e.g. .txt files or .md
4. some tools offer spaced repetition integration, either as core functionality, as plugin, or by syncing to a dedicated SRS app like Anki. If you find a way to frictionlessly create SR cards in your notes, that can be a nice way of keeping some knowledge "cached"
5. keep it simple in general, don't rely too much on specific tools or workflows. they will all cease to work/go out of business at some point.
6. If you are going with any solution that operates on a local folder of .md/.txt/.org files, a nice goodie is that you can actually version your notes with git.","created_at":"2022-07-24T11:09:21Z","created_at_i":1658660961,"objectID":"32212257","parent_id":32211734,"story_id":32211734,"story_title":"Ask HN: What is a sustainable methodology for taking notes of your learning?","updated_at":"2024-09-20T11:36:33Z"}],"hitsPerPage":20,"nbHits":27,"nbPages":2,"page":0,"params":"query=Heptabase&advancedSyntax=true&analyticsTags=backend","processingTimeMS":13,"processingTimingsMS":{"_request":{"roundTrip":15},"afterFetch":{"format":{"highlighting":1,"total":1},"merge":{"mergeLoop":{"prepareNextHit":8,"total":8},"total":8},"total":8},"fetch":{"query":3,"total":4},"total":13},"query":"Heptabase","serverTimeMS":15}