If you try to submit the link https://github.com/fabiospampinato/notable, it will warn you that it was posted a month ago. It didn’t fire here because you added the #readme.
Culturally it’s usually okay to repost after about a year.
I’m working on a notes web app myself so it’s cool to see inspiration like this. I’m using Firebase as a backend instead of local filesystem to support cross-device usage as well as sharing/microblogging.
I find it hard to take the whole genre of “yet another Markdown notes application” seriously until they catch up to the featureset of OneNote or org-mode. Very much dime a dozen.
One essential feature to me for note taking are images (specifically screenshots). “Markdown” is a strong hint that it doesn’t handle images at all. OneNote does that quite well. It just lacks a good journalling function and needs to be cross-platform and Open Source.
You can actually attach arbitrary files to notes in Notable, and even render attachments inline. I think it works fine but you need to somehow link the two.
Very nice! It reminds of The Hit List a bit, and I’ve been looking for a cross-platform open-format replacement for that! Are there any plans to add TODO/task -type features to it?
There are currently a couple of shortcuts for creating/checking todos. I haven’t added anything yet todo-wise because it’s something I don’t really need, and I’m not sure how those features should look like. If you have any suggestions feel free to open a GitHub issue about that, maybe something more specifically todo-oriented could be implemented.
Pretty neat! Code is well-organized too (directory hierarchy is a bit deep haha)!
Could do a mobile version w/ React Native and share a good amount of the code potentially 🤔🤔. Another interesting thing would be having the codemirror elements be executable JS; to the point of rendering components that they are the source of. Or even making various notes modules each other can import. So it becomes a literate code note taking app 🤔🤔.
Yes mobile apps are definitely missing, there could be a good amount of code sharing between the platforms, ideally I’d like to have as close to a single codebase as possible.
I’m not sure what you’re suggesting codemirror-wise, but feel free to open an issue about that on GitHub.
Being native isn’t everything. Btw you’re going to need a HTML renderer anyway if you want to render Markdown notes. Some native apps, like Evernote, use the available engine, at least on macOS, and they have to check if their notes render the same way across platforms, and for some reason they show you a spinner before rendering even simple notes. Notable ships the rendering engine with the app, but at least it doesn’t show you the spinner.
and they have to check if their notes render the same way across platforms,
Doesn’t markdown typically render to all but the simplest of HTML elements? (e.g.,Lists, headers, paragraphs, links) I find it hard to believe that different platforms are going to render this dramatically different (aside from default fonts).
You can put arbitrary HTML inside Markdown. For the most part maybe the result will be the same, but different engines don’t always render out the same thing, so you have to check.
But do you regularly use random HTML in markdown when taking notes? I’ve never needed it. If so, what things are you using? And, how necessary is it? Does the amount of software complexity/bloat really create more value?
I sometimes use the <kbd> tag and the <p> tag for centering images but not much else. You could restrict your support to a narrower syntax, but then that stops being a Markdown renderer for me.
For me, Markdown’s “can copy over HTML” is a mistake. I much prefer it with extensions, to do tables and things. That’s my choice though. Thanks for clarifying your choices.
Does it matter if it renders out the same thing? Heck, even for actual websites some differences per target are expected (and at least by me, appreciated). Extreme example: lynx. Or user stylesheets or min font sizes, etc. One of the nice things about HTML is that it is somewhat flexible like that.
Well, that depends on the markdown processor and output format, doesn’t it? If I use Pandoc to convert markdown to PDF via LaTeX, then I don’t expect to be able to put HTML in there.
I think he meant that if you define Markdown as something different than the common and original definition (text → HTML processor), then yeah, you can’t put arbitrary HTML in a Markdown document.
But this project uses the normal definition of Markdown, which allows arbitrary HTML.
I’m not really familiar with either of those so it would be better for you to try Notable and see the differences for yourself, but from what I can see:
Both of them don’t use GitHub-flavored Markdown, which is one of the main features I want.
Org-mode to the best of my knowledge isn’t graphical, and although way more powerful than Notable I don’t need the extra things it provides. I have still access to global search & replace, git versioning and all that because all of Notable’s notes are also plain files.
TiddlyWiki looks very ugly to me, also I don’t want to use a WYSIWYG editor nor writing crap like this by hand (taken from its homepage):
It seems that TiddlyWiki is trying to solve a problem I don’t care about, from the homepage:
The philosophy of tiddlers is that we maximise the possibilities for re-use by slicing information up into the smallest semantically meaningful units with rich modelling of relationships between them. Then we use aggregation and composition to weave the fragments together to present narrative stories.
Yes, peerflix is almost like cliflix but without the wizard, basically you’ll have to search for the torrents yourself. Also cliflix supports IINA, which it’s important for me since it’s the player I’m using.
cliflix might actually push in the opposite direction in some cases. With others torrent clients one may want to stop seeding as soon as the torrent finishes downloading, or one may limit the bandwidth dedicated to seeing. With cliflix you don’t want to stop seeding as soon as the torrent has been downloaded completely if you’re still watching it because the streaming might stop. Also I’m not sure webtorrent-cli, that cliflix uses under the hood, has an option for limiting the bandwidth at all.
This kind of UI are clearly inciting to completely leech and are heavily deteriorating and centralizing the network. A simple way to mitigate this for regular seeders is to block webtorrents altogether.
On the other hand, I am happy everytime I see people working on the BitTorrent ecosystem :)
@fabiospampinato I am a bit puzzled by this: why did you chose to fork webtorrent-cli in another process over using the web-torrent library?
This kind of UI are clearly inciting to completely leech
I actually think cliflix might achieve the opposite effect in some cases. Read my reply to @znedw about this.
@fabiospampinato I am a bit puzzled by this: why did you chose to fork webtorrent-cli in another process over using the web-torrent library?
Being cliflix a cli app using the cli version of webtorrent seemed the best option since it has a nice interface and we can pass options to it directly from the terminal.
You’ll get to find out once a ruling is handed down - after a year or three of being dragged through court, publicly shamed in newspapers, your computers confiscated as evidence, and multiple arrests (likely causing you to lose your job for non-attendance).
These kinds of tools exist in a legal gray area in the US. They’re not criminally illegal to create, possess, use, distribute, etc.
However, when marketed as a tool for commission of copyright theft, the intent shifts from “enabling distributed information dissemination” to “flout laws” and the courts don’t smile upon that, criminal or civil. The author is more likely to be sued civilly because government lawyers generally have better things to do than pursue criminal copyright violation on such a small scale.
IIRC – and I’ll admit that I’m saying this with intent of someone showing jurisprudence changes since the last time I cared about the subject, years ago – the act of downloading copyrighted material is not illegal under current law, but rather it is distributing the material that is illegal. Add in a worldwide Internet and it becomes exceedingly difficult to prosecute individuals so the focus shifts to those enabling the individuals: the authors of the tools.
However, when marketed as a tool for commission of copyright theft
Do you think cliflix is marketed that way? It has an obvious reference to Netflix in its name, and “watch anything” in its description, but it’s just a tool for streaming torrents, whatever torrents you want it to stream for you.
the focus shifts to those enabling the individuals: the authors of the tools.
cliflix hardly enabled anything that wasn’t already possible before, it’s just some glue code around already existing services.
I’m no lawyer, and I obviously haven’t read the laws of every single country so I guess I can’t be sure something like this is legal everywhere, but I’ll be pretty surprised if somebody sues me (and wins) about cliflix.
a disclaimer saying “Please check and make sure that use of this tool is legal in your country before running.” . Also changing your screenshots to copyleft videos like Sintel might be a good first step.
the act of downloading copyrighted material is not illegal under current law, but rather it is distributing the material that is illegal.
Wouldn’t that count as “reproducing” the work done by transmitted bits instead of a photocopier like with books? The copy doesn’t happen with digital downloads without both parties’ participation. If other people saw it, “public display” might kick in.
The copy doesn’t happen with digital downloads without both parties’ participation.
That’s fair. I may be mistaken: downloading may still be technically illegal but no one has been successfully sued for it unless they openly admitted to downloading. Perhaps it’s that it’s too difficult to prove without an admission. My memory is a little fuzzy.
If other people saw it, “public display” might kick in.
This is a whole other mess. I can show a movie for only members of something, but the moment I let “just anyone” into the event, it’s considered public showing and needs a license or it’s technically illegal. It’s even OK if membership is free and open to all, IIRC.
Re latter point. Public showing of a song they bought plus distribution of cousin’s, wedding video over YouTube is how I got a strike for copyright infringement. An automated system recognized song. Technically had to get two licenses for it. Companies that give them rarely picked up phone for small buyers. Fun stuff.
I am not aware of anyone facing penalties for merely downloading. All of the “omg $50000 fine for downloading” stories I’ve read were actually uploaders.
Im not saying they’re actively goimg after them. Idk what current stats are. I know the prefer suppliers since they can argue higher damages with better settlements or convictions.
Im just saying I think they could get lots of downloaders if they wanted. They could also establish the new, legal theory by going after downloaders using the show or reproduce rights. An easy source would be people’s vids of them with friends or in public with the music in background. Once established in court, they can push companies like Facebook and YouTube to look for that stuff via automated means.
Duplicate of https://lobste.rs/s/mq4tyn/notable_markdown_based_note_taking_app
Are the any guidelines about reposting somewhere?
If you try to submit the link https://github.com/fabiospampinato/notable, it will warn you that it was posted a month ago. It didn’t fire here because you added the #readme.
Culturally it’s usually okay to repost after about a year.
I’m working on a notes web app myself so it’s cool to see inspiration like this. I’m using Firebase as a backend instead of local filesystem to support cross-device usage as well as sharing/microblogging.
Good luck with that :)
I find it hard to take the whole genre of “yet another Markdown notes application” seriously until they catch up to the featureset of OneNote or org-mode. Very much dime a dozen.
One essential feature to me for note taking are images (specifically screenshots). “Markdown” is a strong hint that it doesn’t handle images at all. OneNote does that quite well. It just lacks a good journalling function and needs to be cross-platform and Open Source.
You can actually attach arbitrary files to notes in Notable, and even render attachments inline. I think it works fine but you need to somehow link the two.
Very nice! It reminds of The Hit List a bit, and I’ve been looking for a cross-platform open-format replacement for that! Are there any plans to add TODO/task -type features to it?
There are currently a couple of shortcuts for creating/checking todos. I haven’t added anything yet todo-wise because it’s something I don’t really need, and I’m not sure how those features should look like. If you have any suggestions feel free to open a GitHub issue about that, maybe something more specifically todo-oriented could be implemented.
Pretty neat! Code is well-organized too (directory hierarchy is a bit deep haha)!
Could do a mobile version w/ React Native and share a good amount of the code potentially 🤔🤔. Another interesting thing would be having the codemirror elements be executable JS; to the point of rendering components that they are the source of. Or even making various notes modules each other can import. So it becomes a literate code note taking app 🤔🤔.
Yes mobile apps are definitely missing, there could be a good amount of code sharing between the platforms, ideally I’d like to have as close to a single codebase as possible.
I’m not sure what you’re suggesting codemirror-wise, but feel free to open an issue about that on GitHub.
Describing an electron app as “doesn’t suck” when there are multiple native macOS Markdown editors is a bit rich.
Being native isn’t everything. Btw you’re going to need a HTML renderer anyway if you want to render Markdown notes. Some native apps, like Evernote, use the available engine, at least on macOS, and they have to check if their notes render the same way across platforms, and for some reason they show you a spinner before rendering even simple notes. Notable ships the rendering engine with the app, but at least it doesn’t show you the spinner.
Doesn’t markdown typically render to all but the simplest of HTML elements? (e.g.,Lists, headers, paragraphs, links) I find it hard to believe that different platforms are going to render this dramatically different (aside from default fonts).
You can put arbitrary HTML inside Markdown. For the most part maybe the result will be the same, but different engines don’t always render out the same thing, so you have to check.
But do you regularly use random HTML in markdown when taking notes? I’ve never needed it. If so, what things are you using? And, how necessary is it? Does the amount of software complexity/bloat really create more value?
I sometimes use the
<kbd>tag and the<p>tag for centering images but not much else. You could restrict your support to a narrower syntax, but then that stops being a Markdown renderer for me.For me, Markdown’s “can copy over HTML” is a mistake. I much prefer it with extensions, to do tables and things. That’s my choice though. Thanks for clarifying your choices.
Does it matter if it renders out the same thing? Heck, even for actual websites some differences per target are expected (and at least by me, appreciated). Extreme example: lynx. Or user stylesheets or min font sizes, etc. One of the nice things about HTML is that it is somewhat flexible like that.
I guess it depends on the difference, as long as the note is rendered “ok” the differences may be acceptable.
Well, that depends on the markdown processor and output format, doesn’t it? If I use Pandoc to convert markdown to PDF via LaTeX, then I don’t expect to be able to put HTML in there.
Of course it depends on your definition of “Markdown”.
That then refutes this point:
I think he meant that if you define Markdown as something different than the common and original definition (text → HTML processor), then yeah, you can’t put arbitrary HTML in a Markdown document.
But this project uses the normal definition of Markdown, which allows arbitrary HTML.
Why is this better or different than:
I’m not really familiar with either of those so it would be better for you to try Notable and see the differences for yourself, but from what I can see:
I don’t really understand what this means.
Tiddlywiki is about making a personal knowledge base, not a daily note taking tool.
There’s also Peerflix for this kind of thing https://github.com/mafintosh/peerflix
Yes,
peerflixis almost likecliflixbut without the wizard, basically you’ll have to search for the torrents yourself. Alsocliflixsupports IINA, which it’s important for me since it’s the player I’m using.Please don’t abuse the good people seeding and keeping the swarm alive.
cliflixmight actually push in the opposite direction in some cases. With others torrent clients one may want to stop seeding as soon as the torrent finishes downloading, or one may limit the bandwidth dedicated to seeing. Withcliflixyou don’t want to stop seeding as soon as the torrent has been downloaded completely if you’re still watching it because the streaming might stop. Also I’m not surewebtorrent-cli, thatcliflixuses under the hood, has an option for limiting the bandwidth at all.My thoughts exactly.
This kind of UI are clearly inciting to completely leech and are heavily deteriorating and centralizing the network. A simple way to mitigate this for regular seeders is to block webtorrents altogether.
On the other hand, I am happy everytime I see people working on the BitTorrent ecosystem :)
@fabiospampinato I am a bit puzzled by this: why did you chose to fork webtorrent-cli in another process over using the web-torrent library?
I actually think
cliflixmight achieve the opposite effect in some cases. Read my reply to @znedw about this.Being
cliflixa cli app using the cli version of webtorrent seemed the best option since it has a nice interface and we can pass options to it directly from the terminal.Cool app, but it should probably include extensive warnings about the legal vulnerabilities you’ll create for yourself if you run it.
The author of the tool is exposing himself to more legal problems than an individual using the tool ever will.
I’m curious, is it illegal to create a torrent client and suggest that it can be (properly) used illegally?
You’ll get to find out once a ruling is handed down - after a year or three of being dragged through court, publicly shamed in newspapers, your computers confiscated as evidence, and multiple arrests (likely causing you to lose your job for non-attendance).
These kinds of tools exist in a legal gray area in the US. They’re not criminally illegal to create, possess, use, distribute, etc.
However, when marketed as a tool for commission of copyright theft, the intent shifts from “enabling distributed information dissemination” to “flout laws” and the courts don’t smile upon that, criminal or civil. The author is more likely to be sued civilly because government lawyers generally have better things to do than pursue criminal copyright violation on such a small scale.
IIRC – and I’ll admit that I’m saying this with intent of someone showing jurisprudence changes since the last time I cared about the subject, years ago – the act of downloading copyrighted material is not illegal under current law, but rather it is distributing the material that is illegal. Add in a worldwide Internet and it becomes exceedingly difficult to prosecute individuals so the focus shifts to those enabling the individuals: the authors of the tools.
Keep in mind the dev is from Italy not the US.
Do you think
cliflixis marketed that way? It has an obvious reference to Netflix in its name, and “watch anything” in its description, but it’s just a tool for streaming torrents, whatever torrents you want it to stream for you.cliflixhardly enabled anything that wasn’t already possible before, it’s just some glue code around already existing services.I’m no lawyer, and I obviously haven’t read the laws of every single country so I guess I can’t be sure something like this is legal everywhere, but I’ll be pretty surprised if somebody sues me (and wins) about
cliflix.a disclaimer saying “Please check and make sure that use of this tool is legal in your country before running.” . Also changing your screenshots to copyleft videos like Sintel might be a good first step.
Both videos (Tears of Steel and Star Wreck) used in the readme are available under CC licenses.
Wouldn’t that count as “reproducing” the work done by transmitted bits instead of a photocopier like with books? The copy doesn’t happen with digital downloads without both parties’ participation. If other people saw it, “public display” might kick in.
That’s fair. I may be mistaken: downloading may still be technically illegal but no one has been successfully sued for it unless they openly admitted to downloading. Perhaps it’s that it’s too difficult to prove without an admission. My memory is a little fuzzy.
This is a whole other mess. I can show a movie for only members of something, but the moment I let “just anyone” into the event, it’s considered public showing and needs a license or it’s technically illegal. It’s even OK if membership is free and open to all, IIRC.
Re latter point. Public showing of a song they bought plus distribution of cousin’s, wedding video over YouTube is how I got a strike for copyright infringement. An automated system recognized song. Technically had to get two licenses for it. Companies that give them rarely picked up phone for small buyers. Fun stuff.
I am not aware of anyone facing penalties for merely downloading. All of the “omg $50000 fine for downloading” stories I’ve read were actually uploaders.
Im not saying they’re actively goimg after them. Idk what current stats are. I know the prefer suppliers since they can argue higher damages with better settlements or convictions.
Im just saying I think they could get lots of downloaders if they wanted. They could also establish the new, legal theory by going after downloaders using the show or reproduce rights. An easy source would be people’s vids of them with friends or in public with the music in background. Once established in court, they can push companies like Facebook and YouTube to look for that stuff via automated means.
Thanks for the suggestion, I’ll consider adding a warning about that.