2019-09-11-joplin.html (2582B) - raw

      1 <!-- title: My note taking app: Joplin -->
      2 <!-- slug: joplin -->
      3 <!-- categories: Decentralization, FOSS, Privacy -->
      4 <!-- date: 2019-09-11T00:00:00Z -->
      5 <!-- lastmod: 2019-09-24T00:00:00Z -->
      6 
      7 <p>
      8   Two years ago I had an iPhone and, back then, the native "Notes" app worked pretty well for me.
      9   However, when I changed to Android I had some trouble finding a similar app or a different one
     10   that would fit my needs. For some time I used Google Keep, but I didn't like how the main view
     11   would show you the whole note (instead of having only one line per note, which allows more notes
     12   to fit in the screen). I changed to Evernote for some time—which was definitely more suited for
     13   me—but there were too many ads about getting premium features and, since I didn't need them, I
     14   eventually got tired of it.</p>
     15 <!-- /p -->
     16 
     17 <p>
     18   Back then I already knew what Markdown was, since I had used it to build a website, and I realized
     19   that an app with Markdown support could be a very good alternative. I looked around and finally
     20   found <a href="https://joplinapp.org">Joplin</a>, a free/libre and open source app that supported
     21   Markdown as well as synchronization—perfect for my needs, since I like having notes backed up in
     22   case I lose access to my phone. I have been using it for half a year and so far it has been a
     23   great app. I type my notes with Markdown and once I'm done it renders them beautifully. It also
     24   lets me backup a copy with Nextcloud which is good since it doesn't force me to do it through
     25   Google Drive/Dropbox and on top of that I can set up end-to-end encryption for my backed-up notes!
     26   I haven't paid a lot of attention to what algorithm is used to encrypt since I trust my Nextcloud
     27   provider, however, I know metadata is not encrypted (I'm guessing to make synchronization faster),
     28   but that's fine with me. This also allows me to synchronize my notes with my computer, something
     29   that I had never thought would be useful before, but as I use my computer more and more (and my
     30   phone less and less), it is becoming very convenient.</p>
     31 <!-- /p -->
     32 
     33 <p>
     34   Moreover, since I use it on my computer and I can arrange notes with the use of notebooks, it is
     35   becoming more of a personal wiki than a note-taking app. I have a notebook named "Notes", but the
     36   remaining notebooks hold information in a less "casual" way. I suppose everyone uses notes that
     37   way, but being able to use Markdown allows me to store lots of information in a more convenient
     38   way, especially when dealing with links and fragments of code.</p>
     39 <!-- /p -->
     40