Obsidian.md is The Best Note-Taking App - Change my mind

[Girzo]

I have finally tried Obsidian and can say it truly is the best app.

Why:

• It works wonderfully on all platforms. Fast and snappy.
• It's closed-source, but uses Markdown, which is universal and forever will be supported by computers, you will never loose your notes, nor need to convert them.
• Lots of community plugins. Like Excalidraw, which is a god-like tool for taking handwritten notes.
• Great customizability.
• Your notes get automatically synchronized for free through iCloud or OneDrive.
• Everything is stored on your device/cloud, so no waiting for the database to load, no downtime, and easy backups, you own your notes.
• Supports LaTeX so you can type math equations straight into your notes, you can also use snippets plugin to speed-up your note-taking, snippets are useful for everything, but for Maths and Engineering the most.

Do you see any downsides to this app?

I went through almost every solution, starting with Evernote back in 2015, and this one finally I really love.

[Sincerity]

YES. I just came back to Obsidian this week after a long break from PKM. Right now setting up Dataview (community plugin) and my database of quotes that I will later be able to query by author, tag, type, etc. hehehehehe.

Obsidian is *chef's kiss*. My beloved.

Here are my main community plugins I'm using.

• Admonition - neat looking
• Convert url to preview (iframe) - you can literally watch YT videos that you link in Obsidian aaaaa
• Dataview - you can query your vault if you set it up properly, extremely good shit
• Homepage - useful if you want to have a main note like me
• Local Quotes - I use it to have a random quote from my long list of quotes show up in my main note daily
• Note Refactor - very useful
• Omnisearch - search, but better
• Outliner
• Paste URL Into Selection
• Sort & Permute lines
• QuickAdd - also extremely useful
• Tag Wrangler
• Thumbnails - discovered this today, you can insert a small preview of a YT video with its title and thumbnail, I love it (sometimes I prefer it over inserting an entire playable video)

Edited Saturday at 09:08 PM by Sincerity

[Sincerity]

I guess one downside might be that it can feel overwhelming to beginners, with the amount of core features, let alone community plugins, and overall just the freedom to do anything. It can be a bit hard to start, having so much possibility. But once you get a system established for yourself, it's pure satisfaction.

I find that it's much better to focus on less, rather than more. Don't try to do everything in Obsidian. One doesn't need to use all of its features, eg. the graph view, canvases, daily notes or whatever. Just utilize what you know is useful for your specific purposes.

Edited Saturday at 09:22 PM by Sincerity

[UnbornTao]

1 hour ago, Sincerity said:

YES. I just came back to Obsidian this week after a long break from PKM. 

Thanks, Google!

Edited Saturday at 10:01 PM by UnbornTao

[Sincerity]

@UnbornTao Personal knowledge management.  

[UnbornTao]

It's the one I use for my commonplace book, so I agree.

Edited Saturday at 11:27 PM by UnbornTao

[OmniNaut]

Bases is in development for Obsidian, it's more of a database style to make it closer to Notion. 

For now it's available as a sort of beta for Catalyst (paid) users. But once the feature is deemed stable enough it will be released to the normal version as well.

Be aware that because Obsidian is local based, it's up to you to provide proper back-up. Also you can put it in Dropbox or OneDrive, but because it's unencrypted, the files are open to that company to be scanned and used however they deem necessary. So if you have highly private notes, something to take into account.

Edited Sunday at 05:09 AM by OmniNaut

[Rigel]

I remember giving it up because the phone version was pure trash & expensive. Maybe they fixed it it’s been a while.

[UnbornTao]

30 minutes ago, Rigel said:

I remember giving it up because the phone version was pure trash & expensive. Maybe they fixed it it’s been a while.

Should be free unless you pay for Obsidian Sync. 

[Rigel]

14 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Should be free unless you pay for Obsidian Sync. 

You sort of need it for the app to be any kind of useful no? 

[UnbornTao]

4 hours ago, Rigel said:

You sort of need it for the app to be any kind of useful no? 

I use the phone version occasionally to look up certain files, so I don't personally need online syncing for my phone as much. It depends on how you use it. Obsidian Sync costs $4/month now.

You might want to look into Syncthing or AutoSync. Dropbox might also be an option, or iCloud if you use Apple devices. @OmniNaut's advice sounds legit, too. 

There are also plugins that might offer similar functionality:

https://github.com/vrtmrz/obsidian-livesync

https://github.com/Vinzent03/obsidian-git

Edited Sunday at 03:20 PM by UnbornTao

[Twentyfirst]

How much better is it than the regular apple notes app?

[Rigel]

45 minutes ago, Twentyfirst said:

How much better is it than the regular apple notes app?

They all have trade offs. I like apple notes more than obsidian. If you are a casual note taker you could do away with text edits but that’s kinda ugly. Apple notes is great especially if you own an iPad with pencil .

[Twentyfirst]

3 hours ago, Rigel said:

They all have trade offs. I like apple notes more than obsidian. If you are a casual note taker you could do away with text edits but that’s kinda ugly. Apple notes is great especially if you own an iPad with pencil .

Yeah there is no perfect note taking app. Apple notes doesn't allow for more than 5 subfolders which is annoying. I know they are bringing markdown with the next software update

Im debating whether to get the iPad with the pencil and that paper like screen or a remarkable notebook 

[Rigel]

21 minutes ago, Twentyfirst said:

 

Im debating whether to get the iPad with the pencil and that paper like screen or a remarkable notebook 

I can’t speak on the remarkable but if I remember correctly it’s more of a specific use case device for notes only. iPad is a full computer so it depends on what you need but I can say that apple pencil feels great even without the paper like screen(never tried). I don’t know if you can put a keyboard on the remarkable but that’s something to consider.

[samijiben]

Can you pitch me a case for why I should switch from onenote?

I don't understand what community plug-ins are lol

[Ramanujan]

No need to change your mind. It's the best

[Girzo]

13 hours ago, samijiben said:

Can you pitch me a case for why I should switch from onenote?

I don't like the UI, lack of customization, to put in Math equations you need to use Microsoft Word and Microsoft pushing Copilot AI on you. That's some of my reasons why I don't use OneNote. Your will probably differ or maybe even have no reasons to switch. Hard to pitch something to someone I don't know and already using something with 90% the same capabilities.

And plugins are things you can install into the app to gain new functionalities. You can even write your own plugins if you can code. You have a kind of built-in "App Store" with plugins that you can install, hence the community plugins name, they're add-ons made by users, not the authors of Obsidian.

[Girzo]

@Rigel Apple Notes are unusable to me. The whole thing feels so wooden, default layout sucks, can't tweak it. It's basically Obsidian but worse looking and less functionality. Maybe it's a better experience on iPad with pencil but on MacBook with keyboard it's no bueno. Both Apple Notes and Obsidian sync notes over iCloud out-of-the-box for free.

[Rigel]

19 minutes ago, Girzo said:

@Rigel Apple Notes are unusable to me. The whole thing feels so wooden, default layout sucks, can't tweak it. It's basically Obsidian but worse looking and less functionality. Maybe it's a better experience on iPad with pencil but on MacBook with keyboard it's no bueno. Both Apple Notes and Obsidian sync notes over iCloud out-of-the-box for free.

Cool, use whatever you want. I missed the part where you ask us to change your mind:)