[HN Gopher] Show HN: Notesnook - A cross-platform privacy focuse...
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Show HN: Notesnook - A cross-platform privacy focused zero-
knowledge notes app
Author : thecodrr
Score : 23 points
Date : 2021-04-01 14:25 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (notesnook.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (notesnook.com)
| bobbylarrybobby wrote:
| How easy is it to link to other notes from the current note? This
| is the main thing keeping me on Notion.
| thecodrr wrote:
| Currently, no. I made a prototype for it a while back but we
| had to change editors and it was pushed back. But it won't take
| long to revive so it is definitely in the plans.
| avinassh wrote:
| I like the UI, quite slick. One thing I really care about note
| taking apps is how easy it is take my data out. Do you provide an
| API?
| thecodrr wrote:
| Currently there is no API but all notes can be exported as
| HTML, TXT, PDF, or Markdown. There's also the option to backup.
| mrunseen wrote:
| Is it $4.49[1] or $6.99[2]? $6.99 screenshot is from live editor.
|
| [1]https://i.imgur.com/I1irh9a.png
|
| [2]https://i.imgur.com/c5hz4eq.png
| thecodrr wrote:
| Whoops. My bad. It's 4.49 dollars. Fixing it right now. Thanks
| for trying it out
| thecodrr wrote:
| Fixed.
| Armic wrote:
| Found another issue - in the ipad app changing the font size
| doesnt change the size indicator
| thecodrr wrote:
| Yes, I can reproduce it too. Thanks for letting me know.
| I'll be fixing this tomorrow.
| Armic wrote:
| This looks really cool! Any plans to offer one time payment as an
| alternative to subscriptions? Also heads up clicking login on
| your main website didn't work for me - I had to use signup to go
| to app.notesnook.com and then switch to the login modal
| thecodrr wrote:
| Whoops. Good catch. Fixed it right now.
|
| As for one-time subscription, no unfortunately not. I
| personally don't think it's sustainable because we'll be
| rolling out releases often. The $4.49 subscription gives us a
| good breathing room and support to work on more features. In
| return our users get new features and bug fixes very fast.
| [deleted]
| samstave wrote:
| Looks nice - I have been looking for something like this.
| Currently I have been taking notes in Rstudio.
|
| Can I import my bookmarks easily?
| thecodrr wrote:
| Thank you, I am glad you liked it!
|
| A full importer is in the works that will allow importing from
| all major note-taking apps like Evernote, Standard notes etc
| (with extensibility for more). I can look into adding bookmark
| import support if you can tell more a little bit more about it.
| samstave wrote:
| I think that NotesNook would be dope if it had the following
| feature:
|
| Have it able to import the bookmarks from any browser, and
| keep it on a dedicated "BookMarks" page - allow me to group
| and tag the bookmarks.
|
| Then allow quick referencing to the bookmarks from other
| notes, such that if I start typing the tag, or the URL of a
| URL in the bookmarks, it will quickly link to the URL in the
| bookmarks for that tag, or URL.
|
| Another use of this would be to be able build a "sources"
| list easily.
|
| Else, just allow easy bookmark import :-)
| thecodrr wrote:
| Oh yes! Just last week we were discussing on adding a
| "Links" page that'd allow for easy sharing & organization
| of links and bookmarks in the app.
|
| So yes this is definitely planned.
| thecodrr wrote:
| Hello everyone, lead developer of Notesnook here.
|
| We started out development of Notesnook a year ago with the aim
| of providing a 100% privacy focused note-taking app. At the time,
| Standard Notes was getting the spotlight for it's privacy
| fearures. However, it lacked many essential things that we
| thought were important: 1. Very bad mobile app experience 2. Hard
| to navigate and use 3. No community 4. No customer-developer
| communication
|
| We built Notesnook to address these short comings. In the
| process, we realized that note-taking is unnecessarily hard
| nowadays. With platforms like Notion leading the way, private and
| personal note-taking has been pushed to the far back.
|
| Notesnook brings features like 100% client-side encryption (using
| Argon2 & xchacha20-ietf-poly1305), an easy to use intuitive user
| interface (strictly following 2-tap philosophy), sensible
| organization (through notebooks, topics, tags & colors).
|
| We are currently laying the groundwork for features such as:
|
| 1. Note publishing 2. Secure collaborative note sharing 3. Mobile
| app widgets 4. Extensions (much like VSCode)
|
| There are many more features in the app that you can easily
| preview on the website: https://notesnook.com
|
| We have also set up a Discord server where you can directly come
| and chat with us: https://discord.gg/YHkTRDtAuj
|
| Thank you! Hope you like the app. :)
| k1rcher wrote:
| This looks really interesting, will check it out- the privacy
| aspect is very intriguing.
|
| However I must say that I find myself having difficulties
| adapting to a new note taking environment. I always seem to drift
| back to simple markdown notes in my preferred editor.
|
| Perhaps this is due to ease of access and how efficiently I am
| able to write markdown. The only real issue I have with this
| system is organization. It's very difficult to track down a
| specific note in a file that I have not worked on recently.
|
| For more general note taking and journaling I still prefer pen
| and paper, but that is a whole other topic of discussion :)
| thecodrr wrote:
| Hey, thanks for checking Notesnook out.
|
| I was myself a pen & paper user for notes. That is why I
| designed Notesnook organization system around the concept of
| notebooks & topics because they are very easy to get used to:
|
| A notebook has multiple topics that can have multiple notes. (A
| single note can be under multiple topics - for flexibility).
|
| As for markdown, Notesnook supports most of the markdown spec
| so you won't have any problem there.
|
| I tried to make the app as simple and easy to use as possible
| because I am aware of how clunky and un-user-friendly many
| note-taking apps are. The aim is not to redesign (or reinvent)
| how to take notes but to improve & simplify it.
| k1rcher wrote:
| I love the sound of that.
|
| So far I think the UX is incredibly sleek from my brief usage
| of the iOS app. Writing markdown feels really good, this will
| be a large improvement from the stock iOS app.
|
| Excited to check out the VS Code extension and desktop
| experience.
| thecodrr wrote:
| I am really glad you liked it!
|
| > Excited to check out the VS Code extension and desktop
| experience.
|
| The VS Code extension & the desktop app are in the works.
| We also have plans for a Chrome extension and a CLI app
| (that will greatly make Notesnook editor/platform
| agnostic).
| jappwilson wrote:
| Can you please elaborate on the zero knowledge encryption aspect
| of the app?
|
| What crypto algorithm does it utilise for zero knowledge
| encryption.
| thecodrr wrote:
| Hey! Thank you for checking out Notesnook.
|
| We are using Argon2 for password hashing (both on client and
| server side) and as a KDF. The key is generated client-side on
| the user's browser/mobile and saved in a secure storage
| (IndexedDB on the browser & OS Keychain on mobile).
|
| For data encryption we use XChaCha20-IETF-Poly1305 using the
| well known libsodium library. All the data is encrypted on
| user's device before being sent to the server.
|
| The main details on how all data with the app is handled is
| available here: https://notesnook.com/privacy
| ammarahm-ed wrote:
| This is hot! I will try this one out! Maybe finally I can switch
| to a something that keeps my data to me.
| sebmellen wrote:
| How does this compare to https://standardnotes.org?
| thecodrr wrote:
| Standard Notes is an amazing app and it was actually our first
| inspiration in creating a privacy-focused note-taking app.
|
| Security & encryption wise, both apps use the same encryption
| algorithms, afaik.
|
| However, Standard Notes is expensive ($9/m) whereas Notesnook
| is only $4.49/mo.
|
| Notesnook's organization is more flexible; it has tags, colors,
| notebooks & topics. In comparison, Standard Notes only offers
| colors and tags.
|
| Notesnook's mobile app experience is almost the same as the web
| verison. There's almost 1:1 feature parity. Whereas in Standard
| Notes, the mobile version lacks many of the main features.
|
| We also have more export options (you can export notes as pdf,
| html, md or txt). On the mobile app, there's also Quick Share
| that allows you to share any text or link directly into the app
| without switching contexts (apps).
| commoner wrote:
| The Standard Notes clients, server, and extensions are open
| source (AGPLv3 license):
|
| https://github.com/standardnotes
|
| There is an empty repo for Notesnook:
|
| https://github.com/streetwriters/notesnook
|
| Will Notesnook also become open source, or will it remain
| proprietary?
| thecodrr wrote:
| I just created the repo for issue tracking etc.
|
| I have plans to make certain parts of Notesnook open
| source. Especially the security related ones so they can be
| audited and reviewed by the public.
|
| Notesnook as a product will remain proprietary though.
| alphagrep12345 wrote:
| How does syncing across devices work?
| thecodrr wrote:
| I tried to keep the syncing as simple as possible. All data is
| first encrypted on the device using the user's key and then
| pushed and saved in the server db.
|
| When you login from another device your data is fetched and
| decrypted and shown to you.
| vageli wrote:
| How does this handle conflicting offline writes?
| thecodrr wrote:
| For most cases, the most recently edited copy is kept.
| However, if there's a conflict between 2 notes then a nice
| Git Conflict like UI is shown with both notes side by side
| and their differences highlighted.
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(page generated 2021-04-01 23:03 UTC)