[HN Gopher] Orgzly Revived: a community-maintained version of Or...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Orgzly Revived: a community-maintained version of Orgzly
        
       Author : vpt
       Score  : 124 points
       Date   : 2024-02-16 04:06 UTC (18 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (github.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
        
       | yogorenapan wrote:
       | > The rebranding is due to the disappearance of the Orgzly author
       | 
       | Internet disappearances have become more and more common since
       | COVID times. Honestly scares me
        
         | tetris11 wrote:
         | Same thing happened for the Emacs EXWM author Chris Feng:
         | 
         | https://github.com/ch11ng/exwm
        
         | szundi wrote:
         | Or since the Ukraine War
        
           | walteweiss wrote:
           | The Russian war on Ukraine is the term you were looking for.
        
             | eliotte wrote:
             | Better, the proxy war that is actually between USA-Russia.
        
               | stormking wrote:
               | Bullshit.
        
               | kkzz99 wrote:
               | American weapons, American ISR, American planning,
               | American funding... US politicians talk about a "good
               | investment" and "to the last Ukrainian". I don't
               | understand how you could NOT call it a US-proxy war.
        
               | brunoqc wrote:
               | Yeah. A proxy war doesn't mean that Ukraine doesn't
               | deserve to be free.
               | 
               | We care about Ukraine and its people, the US care about
               | money and power.
        
               | grotorea wrote:
               | We don't call the Korean war the China and USSR-USA war
               | either.
        
               | kkzz99 wrote:
               | I don't think this is the argument you think it is...
        
             | Fice wrote:
             | As a Russian I'd rather call it the Putin's war.
        
             | grotorea wrote:
             | I do wonder if this is the name that history will stick
             | with. Ukrainian War or even Russo-Ukrainian War (the name
             | for the broader conflict starting in 2014) is shorter.
        
               | seanw444 wrote:
               | Russo-Ukrainian war jives better with other historical
               | conflicts.
        
       | firewolf34 wrote:
       | Wow, I live out of Orgzly every day and had no idea this was a
       | thing I needed - every day I am so happy I sub to this site.
       | Thank you for posting!
        
         | radarsat1 wrote:
         | Same here, I use it for todo lists on my phone and didn't know
         | it wasn't being maintained. Although, maybe that's because i
         | haven't encountered any issues. But my use of it is really
         | minimal, as I prefer typing on a keyboard.
        
           | kqr wrote:
           | Looking back, a few years ago I used to get Orgzly updates
           | fairly regularly and I remember thinking, "Wow, it's nice to
           | use actively developed software and get all these features I
           | never expected but which are convenient." That hasn't
           | happened in a while, but I also didn't realise it hadn't.
        
       | account-5 wrote:
       | I tried using this for a couple of months a while back. I could
       | never get into it, but I wish it all the best.
        
         | ParetoOptimal wrote:
         | I understand what you mean even though I use orgzly daily.
        
           | account-5 wrote:
           | I really like the idea but there were a couple of things that
           | made it not work for me. I've now just reverted to iCal for
           | scheduling and tasks.
        
       | colordrops wrote:
       | I used orgzly+syncthing for a while but the overhead of manually
       | resolving conflicts between my laptop and phone were not worth it
       | in the end. I'd consider using it again if a sync protocol or
       | some other mechanism of merging changes across multiple computers
       | is added.
        
         | pinsl wrote:
         | I used the same setup and was also frustrated. I replaced
         | Orgzly with Orgro [0] which can only view files but works much
         | better for my purposes.
         | 
         | [0] https://github.com/amake/orgro/
        
         | wadim wrote:
         | It helps a lot if you have a third machine, which runs 24/7.
         | Haven't had any sync conflicts in ages.
        
           | dietr1ch wrote:
           | Same, added an always-on Raspberry pi + zerotier to the mix
           | and got rid of the sync issues between my phone, laptop and
           | workstation all at once.
           | 
           | I wish there was something to make some sort of CRDT for
           | modeling org though. I feel that the operation that ended up
           | causing text conflicts in the past had obvious resolutions
           | with the right structure and Metadata, but yeah, resorting to
           | having a peer always on gets around it more easily that
           | writing my own thing and deviating from emacs and orgzly
        
             | regularfry wrote:
             | Funnily enough, crdt.el exists. I've tried it for org-mode
             | syncing and the only thing that broke it was having a
             | Windows Emacs connected to the session. It felt like line
             | endings weren't getting handled properly, but I got
             | frustrated with it and gave up in favour of Emacs in a tmux
             | window on a raspberry pi behind my monitor.
        
           | asymmetric wrote:
           | What does the third machine do?
        
             | Kototama wrote:
             | It would minimize the synchronisation lag between the other
             | machines, being more often started.
        
             | wadim wrote:
             | It's a read-only peer with a huge disk which is always on
             | and syncs changes across all devices continuesly. This way
             | you can safely change the same file across all devices,
             | without them having to be online simultaneously.
        
         | accoil wrote:
         | The approach I use is to have a single incoming notes file for
         | my phone. I then refile those notes into the correct location
         | on my laptop later. It works for me because I realised that
         | when I want to take a note on my phone I usually don't have
         | time for a complete note, so the extra refile step gives me the
         | opportunity to fill it out more at my leisure on my laptop. As
         | an extra benefit though, it means that I only have one file
         | that can conflict, and I can just bias resolution towards the
         | phone's version.
        
           | kqr wrote:
           | This is how I also do it, and with ediff-files it is fairly
           | quick to resolve whatever conflicts inevitably come up
           | anyway.
        
       | pachico wrote:
       | Honest question, how does this compare to Google Keep?
        
         | globular-toast wrote:
         | Doesn't share your notes with Google for one. Uses a plain text
         | file to store your notes. Org-mode itself is in a different
         | league when it comes to note taking and organisation.
        
         | PurpleRamen wrote:
         | Google Keep is a poor note manager, but a great app for
         | content-capturing (text, audio, picture, drawing,..). Orgzly is
         | basically the opposite, it's only text and great (for mobile
         | devices) at handling this, but anything else is missing.
         | 
         | And Keep has a nearly perfect sync, but it's on Google for
         | this. While with orgzly you are on your own, which can be
         | annoying depending on how you sync.
        
         | Forge36 wrote:
         | I find the ability work on emacs superior enough I'm moving my
         | notes. Reorganizing is possible with orgzly. I don't use images
         | anymore.
        
       | raffraffraff wrote:
       | How does it compare to other note taking apps like Obsidian,
       | Notion, Joplin etc?
       | 
       | I used Joplin for about a year and ended up taking a lot of
       | notes. But after a year it was so full of garbage that I found it
       | increasingly difficult to keep things tagged, clearing my "inbox"
       | of quickly taken notes. And it ended up looking like my work
       | email inbox.
       | 
       | The catalyst for giving it up was a subtle policy change at work
       | that made me worry about using a personal note taking app with
       | sync to my personal cloud service. I decided to fork my notes
       | into work and personal. Midway through, I just stopped taking
       | long lived notes entirely. I now have one less chore to do.
       | 
       | The same thing happened with my RemMarkable 2. in fact I tired of
       | the RM2 in a much shorter time because it was such a nightmare to
       | sync, search handwritten text etc etc. Pity, because regular note
       | taking apps suck at drawing and diagramming.
       | 
       | Sure, I will forget stuff, but whatever. Most people forget
       | stuff.
       | 
       | Perhaps it's time to revive Joplin and use that Zen-thingemy that
       | was on HN today, the AI tool that gulps your notes and browser
       | history and provides a summariser / searcher? Perhaps that's the
       | only way to take the pain out of note taking apps?
        
         | kkfx wrote:
         | It's an org-mode limited editor, to have org-mode outside
         | Emacs. Compared to MarkDown and "modern note apps" using it
         | it's like a starship (org-mode) against a bike (MD and modern
         | apps), but Orgzly is limited by the OS/input mode of so it's
         | barely usable.
         | 
         | If you want to take notes seriously you need a desktop.
        
           | ParetoOptimal wrote:
           | > If you want to take notes seriously you need a desktop.
           | 
           | Emacs on android and a keyboard also lets you take notes
           | seriously.
        
             | kkfx wrote:
             | With a significant dose of masochism only... At least,
             | IMVHO...
        
               | medstrom wrote:
               | Because of the small screen?
               | 
               | You could use big text, so you can't see that much text
               | onscreen, but it could ironically make it easier to write
               | productively.
        
         | crossroadsguy wrote:
         | After trying so many kinds of note taking apps. I finally keep
         | coming back one that at max supports Markdown (actually I don't
         | need it, but I can tolerate it) and handles plain text files
         | and give me direct access to those plain text files.
         | 
         | > clearing my "inbox" of quickly taken notes
         | 
         | I always have a note pinned on top called "Clipboard".
         | Sometimes I name it "Snippets". Earlier I used to call it
         | "Jottings".
        
         | lukewiwa wrote:
         | After trying all the digital options I'm on to a pocket
         | notebook. I carry it instead of a wallet. Great for jotting
         | down that half thought or random todo.
         | 
         | Long running tasks that get rewritten enough times get put in
         | the calendar or a reminder. Anything else that seems important
         | goes in the personal wiki of choice but honestly a lot of the
         | notes are just ephemeral and don't survive when I switch to a
         | new notebook. And that's perfectly fine!
        
           | raffraffraff wrote:
           | I tried that too, but the RM2 was just a larger, more
           | expensive version of that. The problem is that you can't
           | index, search, share, back up etc. I have up after about 10
           | pages.
           | 
           | That said, my wife bought a hardback diary/planner that has a
           | really nice layout for days/weeks and she uses it every
           | evening.
        
       | yewenjie wrote:
       | I really really need a mobile app for org-mode that syncs without
       | pain (yes, I am aware of Orgzly + Syncthing, I am using it, but
       | it still is not as smooth as I want it to be, and has too many
       | annoyances).
       | 
       | I simply cannot imagine leaving the comfort of org-mode for
       | something inferior like markdown, even though there are cool
       | plugins in the Obsidian ecosystem.
       | 
       | Question if you are an Obsidian user - what are your most
       | important plugins?
        
         | pinsl wrote:
         | Orgro [0] is very nice but currently mostly read only [1]
         | 
         | [0] https://github.com/amake/orgro/
         | 
         | [1] https://orgro.org/faq/
        
         | alwayslikethis wrote:
         | Logseq supports org files. Though it does have a pretty
         | different default workflow, which is heavy on backlinks and
         | tags.
        
           | Barrin92 wrote:
           | is the performance still abysmal? The last time I tried it, a
           | few months ago, you couldn't edit a full page of text without
           | logseq telling you that editing and indexing was disabled for
           | performance reasons. Which is truly bizarre. Sadly didn't
           | work as a replacement for me for that reason.
        
         | raybb wrote:
         | What issues are you having with syncthing?
         | 
         | I use it for obsidian and I had quite a bit of annoyances with
         | it until I started having a node running on a VPS that was
         | always on and set the IP address /domain in the mobile
         | application so that it connects almost instantly. Then it
         | didn't matter what my phone and laptop were doing because they
         | could both always connect to the VPS and syncing happened
         | within a second or so.
        
         | Forge36 wrote:
         | What do you need syncing for? In my case I sync over WebDAV and
         | the remote is backed by a git client. This lets me sync with
         | emacs
        
         | ParetoOptimal wrote:
         | You need to:
         | 
         | - enable save/sync on resume orgzly
         | 
         | - ensure inotify based sync enabled on orgzly folder
         | 
         | - enable polling every minute on syncthing folder
         | 
         | - sync files by most recently modified
        
         | rednerrus wrote:
         | workflowy is the best thing I've used to replace org-mode on my
         | phone.
        
       | dig1 wrote:
       | Great app, and I'm happy someone picked it up. I have been using
       | it for a few years after I switched from MobileOrg [1]. Regarding
       | sync and conflict handling, I find using it with git a much
       | better experience, assuming the git client is installed on the
       | phone.
       | 
       | These days, I prefer (fountain) pen and paper, but I still like
       | to throw org-mode syntax across notebooks - it is a no-brainer to
       | retype it or try with some OCR in the future.
       | 
       | [1] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.matburt.mobileorg/
        
       | deepnet wrote:
       | Orgzly means my Org agenda can give me phone notifications, which
       | means one more thing automated and so one less thing I have to
       | pay attention to
        
       | linmob wrote:
       | My solve for this is proper Emacs on a mobile monstrosity (a
       | PinePhone Pro with the keyboard accessory). See [0] for more on
       | that.
       | 
       | [0]: https://linmob.net/using-the-pinephone-pro-daily-despite-
       | hav...
        
         | Forge36 wrote:
         | I use both. Normal Android phone with a 60% keyboard.
        
       | exe34 wrote:
       | Does it have an option to open a file in place in my shared data
       | directory? I don't need to "import" a file into its app data
       | space, and I want to keep using mgit/syncthing to sync across
       | devices.
       | 
       | At the moment I have a script that calls org-html-export-to-html
       | which I sync to view, but obviously can't update on the device
       | (without setting up emacs).
        
       | jlokier wrote:
       | I'm using Orgzly on my phone now to take notes. I also have Emacs
       | on my various computers, always open on at least one, though I
       | never got into Org-mode much. Now, I'd like to try having the
       | same notes on all devices.
       | 
       | Synchthing is mentioned often with Orgzly, so I looked into
       | Syncthing. I've been disappointed to find Syncthing drains the
       | phone battery excessively if you enable continuous (event-driven)
       | two-way sync between phone and server.
       | 
       | The problem is Syncthing doesn't hook into the phone's
       | notification delivery service, so it can only pick up changes by
       | keeping a socket open to the server and sending packets often,
       | throughout the day, to keep the socket alive. Even if there are
       | no file changes to report. That drains the battery much faster
       | than, say, a chat app that uses the notification service to send
       | triggers from the server to the phone when there's a new message.
       | (I wrote about technical reasons why that's more battery-
       | efficient here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38661294).
       | 
       | Does anyone have a recommendation that will keep notes in Orgzly
       | two-way synchronised with Org files on my server, reliably,
       | without draining the phone battery excessively, and without a
       | long delay for changes on the server to propagate to the phone?
        
         | bloopernova wrote:
         | I'm using my fastmail webdav storage. It's accessible from my
         | phone for orgzly, and desktop for Emacs.
         | 
         | Edited to add: In Orgzly Revived go to Settings -> Sync ->
         | Repositories and add
         | https://myfiles.fastmail.com/subfoldername/ (I use "Org")
        
           | V1ndaar wrote:
           | Thanks your your input. You made me realize I can use my
           | Hetzner storage box for precisely the same. Neat!
        
         | rrix2 wrote:
         | I use https://github.com/Catfriend1/syncthing-android which has
         | an option to run only every X minutes of each hour, as a decent
         | tradeoff.
         | 
         | This version also ships and Android Quick Settings tile that
         | will start Syncthing for those X minutes and stop it outside of
         | that schedule, so I'll hit the button as I'm putting on shoes
         | to go out after making a shopping list on my phone or what have
         | you
        
       | axpy906 wrote:
       | I read that name wrong. Time to get more coffee
        
       | xenodium wrote:
       | If you're looking for an iOS counterpart, I built
       | https://plainorg.com
        
       | sudhirkhanger wrote:
       | I am still using Orgzly because it supports Dropbox.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2024-02-16 23:02 UTC)