KeenWrite VS Zettlr

Compare KeenWrite vs Zettlr and see what are their differences.

KeenWrite

Free, open-source, cross-platform desktop Markdown text editor with live preview, string interpolation, and math. (by DaveJarvis)
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KeenWrite Zettlr
98 116
621 9,597
- 1.7%
0.0 9.9
7 months ago 3 days ago
Java TypeScript
GNU General Public License v3.0 or later GNU General Public License v3.0 only
The number of mentions indicates the total number of mentions that we've tracked plus the number of user suggested alternatives.
Stars - the number of stars that a project has on GitHub. Growth - month over month growth in stars.
Activity is a relative number indicating how actively a project is being developed. Recent commits have higher weight than older ones.
For example, an activity of 9.0 indicates that a project is amongst the top 10% of the most actively developed projects that we are tracking.

KeenWrite

Posts with mentions or reviews of KeenWrite. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2023-08-16.
  • Ask HN: Tell us about your project that's not done yet but you want feedback on
    68 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 16 Aug 2023
    KeenWrite is my free, open-source, cross-platform desktop Markdown editor that can produce beautifully typeset PDFs. I started working on it years ago to help write a novel that has a complex timeline and I couldn't find a text editor that would allow me to integrate a character sheet with the story itself.

    https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite

    Tutorials:

    * https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB-WIt1cZYLm1MMx2FBG9...

    Here's what I mean by using variables directly:

    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFCqe3A5dFg

    CommonMark doesn't propose a standard for bibliographic references. Would anyone find the editor more appealing if it had cross-references and citations?

  • Documentation as Code for Cloud Using PlantUML
    8 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 30 Jul 2023
    My cross-platform desktop text editor, KeenWrite, allows users to define variables in an external YAML file. The editor calls out to Kroki[1] to convert text-based diagrams to SVG. The diagrams can reference variables and are rendered using EchoSVG[2].

    KeenWrite[3] can produce PDF documentation from Markdown documents that has PlantUML diagrams with elements stored in an external, machine-readable file. Here are screenshots showing variables on the left, diagram text in the middle, and a real-time render on the right:

    * https://raw.githubusercontent.com/DaveJarvis/KeenWrite/main/...

    * https://raw.githubusercontent.com/DaveJarvis/KeenWrite/main/...

    KeenWrite supports all diagrams offered by Kroki, which includes "diagram-plantuml".

    [1]: https://kroki.io/

    [2]: https://github.com/css4j/echosvg/

    [3]: https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite

  • On why Markdown is not a good, or even a half-decent, markup language
    9 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 19 Jul 2023
  • MdBook – Create book from Markdown files. Like Gitbook but implemented in Rust
    30 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 29 Jun 2023
  • KeenWrite 3.3.2: MermaidJS diagrams (with caveat)
    1 project | /r/Markdown | 24 Jun 2023
    1 project | news.ycombinator.com | 24 Jun 2023
  • Interactive CommonMark Tutorial
    2 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 24 Jun 2023
    Although not interactive, I've created a video series that shows advanced usage of Markdown. Namely R, external variables, diagrams, math, annotations, and a different approach to metadata:

    * https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB-WIt1cZYLm1MMx2FBG9...

    Tutorial 4 shows basic Markdown:

    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNbGSiRzx-0

    The top-right of each video shows keyboard and mouse clicks to help follow along.[1] My desktop text editor, KeenWrite[2], is used in the tutorials.

    [1]: https://github.com/DaveJarvis/kmcaster

    [2]: https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite

  • “Exit Traps” Can Make Your Bash Scripts Way More Robust and Reliable
    6 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 20 Jun 2023
    https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite/blob/main/scripts/bu...

    My template script provides a way to make user-friendly shell scripts. In a script that uses the template, you define the dependencies and their sources:

        DEPENDENCIES=(
  • EchoSVG: SVG rasterizer library supporting level 4 selectors (Apache 2)
    4 projects | /r/java | 8 Jun 2023
    I didn't create the fork, nor am I affiliated with the project. I use it in my text editor, KeenWrite to rasterize SVG.
  • Millions of dollars in time wasted making papers fit journal guidelines
    5 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 8 Jun 2023
    KeenWrite Themes[1] are instructions that tell ConTeXt how to typeset XHTML documents (content) into PDF files (presentation). I made a tutorial that shows how my FOSS desktop text editor, KeenWrite[3], allows users to write in Markdown to typeset a document against a particular theme.

    Before it can be used for scientific papers, it needs cross-references, which, unfortunately, aren't part of the CommonMark specification.

    I posit that the vast majority of LaTeX users don't grok how to separate content from presentation. When I asked a question on TeX.SE about how to adjust the line spacing between enumerated items (spanning a couple dozen enumerated lists), the vast majority of people voted for the answer of using `\itemsep0em` to tweak each list ... individually.[4] The correct answer, IMO, is to fix the problem globally, and not waste time tweaking individual lists.

    [1]: https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite-themes

    [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QpX70O5S30

    [3]: https://github.com/DaveJarvis/keenwrite

    [4]: https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/6081/reduce-space-be...

Zettlr

Posts with mentions or reviews of Zettlr. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2023-12-26.

What are some alternatives?

When comparing KeenWrite and Zettlr you can also consider the following projects:

markdown-preview.nvim - markdown preview plugin for (neo)vim

logseq - A local-first, non-linear, outliner notebook for organizing and sharing your personal knowledge base. Use it to organize your todo list, to write your journals, or to record your unique life.

marktext - 📝A simple and elegant markdown editor, available for Linux, macOS and Windows.

Trilium Notes - Build your personal knowledge base with Trilium Notes

typst - A new markup-based typesetting system that is powerful and easy to learn.

obsidian-export - Rust library and CLI to export an Obsidian vault to regular Markdown

vim-markdown - Markdown Vim Mode

kroki - Creates diagrams from textual descriptions!

obsidian-pandoc - Pandoc document export plugin for Obsidian (https://obsidian.md)

xenops - An editing environment for LaTeX mathematical documents

obsidian-releases - Community plugins list, theme list, and releases of Obsidian.