Zim – A Desktop Wiki

This page summarizes the projects mentioned and recommended in the original post on news.ycombinator.com

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  • obsidian-releases

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

    I mentioned this in another subthread, but have you checked out Obsidian [1]?

    - It's a product, not a service (they do offer their own paid syncing service though)

    - It is backed by plaintext: markdown files in folders. As for Git, I'm pretty sure you could use it easily- and I noticed there's also a community-supported Git integration plugin [2].

    - Just tested link renaming, it's there.

    - It does have a tagging system. I haven't used it extensively enough to see if the rest of your requirements are met, but it seems very thorough.

    - The desktop and mobile clients do support full-text search. Not sure how it's indexed but it is quite fast.

    - Server + browser interface: unfortunately, it doesn't look like this is the case out of the box, but since the files are Just Markdown On A Filesystem I feel like you could probably just have a completely unrelated server to make changes to them.

    - Native desktop app: hate to break the news, but the desktop app is Electron. That being said, it's extremely snappy and doesn't seem like a complete memory hog. (A cursory check of Activity Monitor says it's got four processes running, using 127 MB, 73 MB, 55MB, and 11.8MB.)

    - Sync over git/github- again, community supported, but the plugin [2] looks quite solid and offers plenty of the kind of features you might like. I would also note that because everything's just Markdown files, other syncing mechanisms like Dropbox or iCloud "just work". They have a mobile app as well, and seamless iCloud syncing has been the killer feature for me.

    - Publishing is an interesting one. They do have a paid service which allows you to "publish" vaults, which basically means they do the static rendering and then host it for you. It looks like their static rendering gives the published version of a vault a "table of contents" pane and other stuff. I imagine it wouldn't be too tricky to do this oneself, and you could possibly even integrate it into the editor.

    - So, CLI/Vim editing works like a dream. I just edited a file from Vim and immediately saw it updated in the desktop and mobile apps. Updating backlinks works in the app just fine, but simply moving files around in the filesystem doesn't update backlinks.

    - Yeah, this kinda is a whole concern of its own, but for what it's worth: images and media are stored in the same directory structure as Markdown files, and can be embedded into a "note" via linking. (like ![[imagename.jpg]]). So I imagine you could keep them in a separate directory that's gitignored or something like that.

    1: https://obsidian.md/

  • zim-desktop-wiki

    Main repository of the zim desktop wiki project

    Jaap is open to it but it's lower priority. It's been an open issue for years https://github.com/zim-desktop-wiki/zim-desktop-wiki/issues/...

  • SurveyJS

    Open-Source JSON Form Builder to Create Dynamic Forms Right in Your App. With SurveyJS form UI libraries, you can build and style forms in a fully-integrated drag & drop form builder, render them in your JS app, and store form submission data in any backend, inc. PHP, ASP.NET Core, and Node.js.

  • Joplin

    Joplin - the secure note taking and to-do app with synchronisation capabilities for Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS.

    I use Joplin, which has a similar feature set but also mobile apps:

    https://joplinapp.org/

    It supports various types of file stores for syncing between devices. I've used OneDrive and WebDAV. The project has also recently launched a cloud service for people who want to sync between devices but don't want to set up a network file store.

  • GitJournal

    Mobile first Note Taking integrated with Git

    I'm the GitJournal author.

    I'd be open to adding the zim wiki syntax support, assuming I can have at least one designated person who uses Zim, and can test things out and report issues. GitJournal now has basic support for OrgMode, and the code is now in a state where it doesn't necessarily assume Markdown.

    How about you file an issue on GitHub? [0]. Ideally, if you could get some other people to vote on it, I'll be more motivated to prioritize it.

    Additionally, do you know a good source for the zim syntax? I see [1] and [2].

    [0] - https://github.com/GitJournal/GitJournal/issues

    [1] - https://zim-wiki.org/manual/Help/Wiki_Syntax.html

    [2] - https://zim-wiki.org/manual/Help/Check_Boxes.html

  • zimfw

    Zim: Modular, customizable, and blazing fast Zsh framework

    Not to be confused with Zim [0], a zsh configuration framework that's generally faster than oh-my-zsh [1].

    [0] https://github.com/zimfw/zimfw

    [1] https://ohmyz.sh/

  • ohmyzsh

    🙃 A delightful community-driven (with 2,200+ contributors) framework for managing your zsh configuration. Includes 300+ optional plugins (rails, git, macOS, hub, docker, homebrew, node, php, python, etc), 140+ themes to spice up your morning, and an auto-update tool so that makes it easy to keep up with the latest updates from the community.

    Not to be confused with Zim [0], a zsh configuration framework that's generally faster than oh-my-zsh [1].

    [0] https://github.com/zimfw/zimfw

    [1] https://ohmyz.sh/

  • obsidian-git

    Backup your Obsidian.md vault with git

  • InfluxDB

    Power Real-Time Data Analytics at Scale. Get real-time insights from all types of time series data with InfluxDB. Ingest, query, and analyze billions of data points in real-time with unbounded cardinality.

  • tiddlyd

    Very simple way to get a TiddlyWiki instance up and running, using Adam Ruppe's arsd.cgi

    I wrote this[1] because I wanted something that didn't require any setup and I didn't want all kinds of features getting in my way. Just run the server and have it save the wiki to my hard drive. I guess you do have to install a D compiler in order to compile it, which might be classified as setup.

    https://github.com/bachmeil/tiddlyd

  • admonitions

    Adds admonition block-styled content to Obsidian.md

    A bit off-topic (but still related to making Markdown more usable), I found an Admonition plugin[0] for Obsidian the other day that really knocked my socks off. I love having visual guides in wikis that help draw your attention to various things, and this is really perfect for my uses. If Zim had a similar function, I might be tempted to start using it again...

    [0] https://github.com/valentine195/obsidian-admonition

  • 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.

    I really want to share logseq[0] if anyone isn’t yet familiar with it, I’ve been using it for a few months and it is absolutely fucking superb.

    I like it so much I became a sponsor. Same kinda deal, writes markdown you spaff at gitlab or wherever, but with a graph, amazing linking and soft (unreferenced) links, it’s literally my external brain at this point.

    Few tools I can recommend so much, and it doesn’t even have a vi mode yet. I hope to continue using it for many years.

    0: https://logseq.com/

  • widdler

    A WebDAV server for TiddlyWikis

  • WikidPad

    WikidPad is a single user desktop wiki

  • TiddlyDesktop

    A custom desktop browser for TiddlyWiki 5 and TiddlyWiki Classic, based on nw.js

    I hear you on this problem and it took a while to find a solution I like. Ultimately, I went with https://github.com/Jermolene/TiddlyDesktop and file syncing tool of my choice. It seems to work well, but you can have issues if you simultaneously edit.

  • advanced-tables-obsidian

    Improved table navigation, formatting, and manipulation in Obsidian.md

    Obsidian (https://obsidian.md/) + a few plugins:

    - Advanced Tables (handful of features including sort while in edit mode): https://github.com/tgrosinger/advanced-tables-obsidian

  • obsidian-sortable

    Table sorting plugin for https://obsidian.md

    - Sortable (Wikipedia-like for view mode): https://github.com/alexandru-dinu/obsidian-sortable/issues

  • obsidian-dataview

    A data index and query language over Markdown files, for https://obsidian.md/.

  • notes-android

    ✎ Android client for Nextcloud Notes app.

    I actually have my own little nextcloud instance running on a $5/month digital ocean virtual private server. My intent was for family (only 3 people) and i to use it...but honestly, most of the time it is only me. I draft conventional old text files (though i do use markdown)...and save the files in a nextcloud folder to enable sync anywhere. For actually synching and drafting of the text/note files, i have the nextcloud mobile app as well as the nextcloud notes app on my phone (https://github.com/stefan-niedermann/nextcloud-notes)...so now i can jot down notes anywhere that i carry my phone. I do lack some advanced features that zim wiki would bring, like linkages, some color formatting, styles...but for my workflow i found them not to be ultra necessary anyway. Side note: i use nextcloud for general file synching, rss/feed reading, and other functions...so it was not setup only/specifically for notes...the note taking just came along as an extra benefit. Any headaches in managing my own nextcloud instance (and just like managing any of your own infrastructure, there are always costs), are outweighed by all the features that i legitimately use/benefit from nextcloud.

    If you use nextcloud, you could also use other text editors on mobile phone like joplin, qOwnNotes, etc. - so you are not stuck only with the nextcloud notes app. Also, if you are not an adherent to open source software, my workflow can also be used via dropbox, box.com, onedrive, etc. too i suppose (you're just drafting notes on the road and saving them up to someone e;lse's server/cloud). I hope that helps!

  • WorkOS

    The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS. The APIs are flexible and easy-to-use, supporting authentication, user identity, and complex enterprise features like SSO and SCIM provisioning.

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