
Show HN: FAQT – A lightweight, personal knowledge base - siavosh
http://faqt.co/
======
captn3m0
For those who are wondering how the styling looks, I signed up and copy-pasted
a markdown sample here:
[https://app.faqt.co/share/k6hs7l](https://app.faqt.co/share/k6hs7l)

This looks pretty cool. I think I'l be using this from now on. Features I'd
like to see in the future:

\- custom domain (esp for teams, which I see is in the works)

\- Revision History

\- Exports/Backups

\- Searching

\- Raw markdown support. I often like to copy markdown from places, and this
would come handy. Just a .md at the end of the route would do.

\- API support is always nice

Also, while you are working at a team solution, you might want to take a look
at this blog post [0] from xoxco, where they describe their knowledge base
that integrates very well with slack.

[0]: [https://medium.com/why-not/our-slack-
wiki-e4f6d23a3495](https://medium.com/why-not/our-slack-wiki-e4f6d23a3495)

~~~
siavosh
This is helpful, thanks for sharing. We've struggled with where to integrate
with first as most integrations I've seen have been gratuitous, but #slack is
a solid possibility. Curious about the API support, how would you use it?

~~~
captn3m0
While I do have a _drafts directory for my blog under version control, editing
it locally is a pain. What I'd like to do:

\- write the blog post drafts under a `Drafts` category at faqt \- Run a
script that fetches all drafts and commits them in my drafts repo when I run
it

That way, my repo stays updated, and I don't have to worry about copying-
pasting updates there. I could even write a "publish-from-faqt-to-blog" script
that detects a category change from "Drafts" to "Published" and handles that
for me.

Would you be considering front-matter yaml support. If you add that,
tagging+searching things would become so much better. (Every doc gets its own
set of properties).

Also, if you give us an API, we can make more integrations ourselves. That is
one of the main reasons behind Slack's success.

~~~
hobofan
For such a use-case Contentful[0] might be viable solution.

[0] [https://www.contentful.com](https://www.contentful.com)

------
tjosten
How can a website / service be operated in 2015 without _any_ contact or legal
information? How am I supposed to use this for my personal information without
being able to read the privacy statements or knowing who's operating the
service to what purpose?

Edit: To make the reason for my comment clear, there was no link in the footer
like there is now at the time I wrote it.

~~~
zyxley
Not to mention some jurisdictions _requiring_ a privacy policy, like
California.

~~~
15155
Believe it or not, the online world doesn't revolve around California or the
European Union.

One of the best "features" of the internet is that it is jurisdictionally
grey.

Otherwise, why not just subject the entire world to the stringent requirements
of China?

~~~
adambatkin
While it's true that it may not be a _legal requirement_ (in some
jurisdictions) to post a privacy policy, it's probably not a good idea to
trust a service without one, particularly if said service is designed for
posting potentially private personal information.

In other words: They should post a privacy policy - not because it's a legal
requirement (though it may be) - but because it's good business. And no one
will trust them otherwise.

~~~
Karunamon
Serious question: Do people treat privacy policies any different than EULA's?
(To wit: Abstruse legalese that doesn't really tell anyone anything?)

I can summarize 95% of privacy policies right here:

    
    
        * We won't sell your info (directly)
        * We "may" provide your info to third parties based on ill-defined criterion
        * We can change this at any time without telling you first
        * If we get bought (which is likely), this is all rendered invalid
        * If we break our word here, your recourse is precisely jack

------
fiatjaf
Another "write your text here" and nothing more app.

I'm not questioning the usefulness of this, but why do we have so many simple
apps like these? People writing code to do the same thing over and over again,
aren't you bored?

~~~
cad
evernote kind of apps don't work. Except Google Keep. Keep kinda works.

~~~
stephenson
The only problem is that Google dont keep services alive.

~~~
thefox
What warrant us that Faqt.co is still alive next week? Nothing. Every service
on the Internet can be shut down. Google services are as long online as Google
profit from them.

~~~
stephenson
Faqt.co could as well yes, but google has quit a history of closing down small
services.

> Google services are as long online as Google profit from

How do the profit from Keep?

~~~
icebraining
_Faqt.co could as well yes, but google has quit a history of closing down
small services._

After years of service, and with months of warning and a tool to export your
data. Keep's predecessor (Notebook) lasted 6 years. Reader lasted 8. Orkut
lasted 10. How many startups live for that long? How many don't suddenly shut
down, leaving you stranded?

------
malexw
This is great!

A boss at an old job used to track little nuggets of information in a Word Doc
he called his "Master" file. It had everything from bugs he had discovered
with rare microcontrollers, to short reviews of meals he ordered at
restaurants. (The idea behind the meals reviews is that the next time he went
to the restaurant, he could look up what he had last time and decide if he
wanted to have it again, or try something different)

I never could get as hardcore into this 'knowledge logging' thing, but I've
been interested in a tool like this for a while now.

~~~
siavosh
That's exactly what I did that led to this--a master google document that
quickly became impossible to use or maintain. I wrote a quick blog post about
it: [http://blog.faqt.co/post/121242652146/a-note-app-to-
replace-...](http://blog.faqt.co/post/121242652146/a-note-app-to-replace-your-
ziploc-bag)

~~~
malexw
Well, consider me a user. Is this a side-project for you, or are you going to
build a company around it? Naturally, I'd like to know that if I enter my data
in here, I'll be able to export a copy of it in the unfortunate event that you
have to shut down the service.

~~~
siavosh
Thanks, we're hoping to build something lasting, but that's a fair question. A
group of my co-workers, friends, and family use it everyday, and the last
thing we'd do is disrespect that trust. I use the site everyday for my own
work, and if we ever have to cease service, be sure that we'd have a free
export function. It's an MVP right now, so there's plenty of things we'd like
to add. Also feel free to reach out to us directly at hello@faqt.co

~~~
jnbiche
> if we ever have to cease service, be sure that we'd have a free export
> function.

...and open up the source under a proper open-source license, I'd hope?

------
Gmo
Sounds interesting ! And quite funny since I was looking for something similar
last week (and didn't find anything really fitting what I want).

A couple of questions :

\- do you have any kind of versioning/revision history ? Especially on the
individuals "facts"

\- do you have a search function ? How does it work ?

\- Any kind of tagging system apart from the color code ?

\- any way to export the raw data ?

\- any plan of an API otherwise ?

\- like other have mentioned, it's a bit of a touchy area, I'm fine with
hosting it if it means I can access it from anywhere and I know my data is not
sold some way or some other, but my 3nd point would be at least one thing to
worry less if it would ever go down. Which leads me on my last point : What's
your business model ?

PS: Anyone else @HN that knows of something similar ? (apart from evernote)

Edited for styling

~~~
rndn
> _Anyone else @HN that knows of something similar ? (apart from evernote)_

I'm currently experimenting with Emacs org-mode, Microsoft OneNote and a
personal MediaWiki install on localhost. My observations so far:

\- _Emacs org-mode_ : (+) integrated power of my Emacs setup, (+) great key
bindings, (+) based on text files, (-) difficult to learn, (-) no fancy UI,
drag-n-drop

\- _Microsoft OneNote_ : (+) nice UI, (+) good mouse support, (+) drag-n-drop,
(-) proprietary format, (-) no LaTeX

\- _MediaWiki_ : (+) rich wiki capabilities, (+) great revision management,
(+) available in local network on any device, (+) everything in the browser,
(-) painful updating, migrating, installing, (-) slow, no good keybindings

My conclusion so far: I'm torn between MediaWiki and org-mode. OneNote is a
bit too proprietary for my taste. Next I’m going to move everything to org-
mode and work on ways to publish my notes with LaTeX markup on the intranet
and to include pictures more easily.

~~~
vmarsy
A feature from OneNote I love and nobody knows about because of poor marketing
is the "me@onenote.com" [1]. You send an email to it, it creates a note where
Email subject = Note title, and email content = the note text

I linked my gmail account to it (it doesn't require to sync email between the
gmail and the outlook account) and I email "me@onenote.com" all the time.

If you just put a URL in the subject of your email, OneNote will create a note
with the HTML page extracted (so it's fully searchable) as well as a
screenshot of the page!

[1] [https://blogs.office.com/2014/03/17/email-your-notes-into-
on...](https://blogs.office.com/2014/03/17/email-your-notes-into-onenote-with-
meonenote-com/)

------
buster
How can something which is _personal_ and supposed to be _lightweigth_ a web
site? Do i understand right that my data is hosted on their servers? Oh
well...

~~~
mfisher87
Exactly what excited and then disappointed me. It's a great idea, but I think
making it a service will make some people uncomfortable with natural use cases
(ex: diary?) for a tool like this. I have been working on something (probably
simpler than, but similar) like this that would be self-hosted, mostly because
there's a lot of stuff I didn't want to store on Trello or other "cloud"
knowledgebase tools. The markdown editing view from the product page is almost
exactly what I was aiming for, so I really like it :)

~~~
icewater0
Honestly I'm not even comfortable with my work interactions being stored on
Slack. I would never use a service like this for personal info.

------
Axsuul
Congrats on the launch! Your main competitor here is Evernote so I would
highly recommend you implement a "Import from Evernote" feature, or at least
tout it.

I'm happy with Evernote but the main disgruntle I have is the lack of Markdown
capability, which you're making very clear, and any other developer-friendly
features. There could be a big opportunity here if you can segregate yourself
from Evernote by niche-ing yourself towards developers and technical folk.
There's definitely a void here.

------
tommoor
The frontpage design is nice, I can see the value - currently I'd use
workflowy for small pieces of information like this.

I think you're missing a trick by not having any of your example's linked to
an actual FAQT - those 8 boxes should link to shared examples, even the link
in the share field at the bottom 404's :(

------
listic
For some reason, I have expected it to be installable on my own hardware, not
SaaS. That's the kind of _personal_ I am looking for right now.

------
weaksauce
for those interested in an even more lightweight version of this and have zsh
open all the time, I wrote a small zsh function that has proven to be
invaluable. basically all you do is type mm <tab> and then it lists all your
files inside the personal "man" folder inside your home directory. basically
~/man/manpages/filename and you can create files easily that was too. by just
typing `mm newfilename` and it will open up vi to that new file. no server at
all and it works just dandy for notes and the like.

[https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b751aee935dd7892e049](https://gist.github.com/anonymous/b751aee935dd7892e049)

edit: you could probably make it a git directory and have a daemon watching
that folder for changes and when changes happen you could have it commit that.
just a thought.

~~~
weaksauce
I can't edit it anymore but you need to edit your .zshrc file and put that in
there. It's probably pretty basic but I thought I should say it. also, this is
a good script to show as a template if you wanted to add your own basic tab
completion to zsh.

------
deanclatworthy
This looks really nice. A small suggestion: Put a video, demo, screenshots or
tour on the homepage. I found it kind of hard to visualize how the product
actually looks and works from the information you have on your homepage.

And a (well-meaning) question: why would I use this over say trello, or google
docs?

~~~
siavosh
Glad you asked, wrote about it here:
[http://blog.faqt.co/post/121242652146/a-note-app-to-
replace-...](http://blog.faqt.co/post/121242652146/a-note-app-to-replace-your-
ziploc-bag)

------
ssriram
Cool stuff. Would love to have "memorable urls" or wiki like [[Title becomes
link]] syntax so I can build out a lightweight, personal faqtiki - Currently
one needs to get the share link and do a [page](share url) to accomplish it (a
multi-step non-memorable way)

------
dmix
You really need a demo on the homepage.

For ex: you should remove the need to signup to use it first, let them create
a FAQ, then signup to save it to a particular account.

------
dmcswain
Nice! And here's a speech interface that lets FAQT users load notes by voice
command from Chrome, Android, or Android Wear. (Voice commands, like FAQT
notes, can be shared.)

[https://goo.gl/1VwtE1](https://goo.gl/1VwtE1)

~~~
dmcswain
FAQT from a smartwatch: [https://goo.gl/OBz6tA](https://goo.gl/OBz6tA)

------
ecthiender
Haven't people been doing this for a long time? Maintaining and categorizing
their pieces of personal knowledge - in files?

I personally don't understand, why such a tool need to exist. I thought
humanity solved this problem the day we started to write down things. From
stones, to papyrus, to personal diaries, and now to personal files on personal
disks on personal laptops/desktops.

I don't understand, why suddenly someone would want to put their personal
knowledge base on someone else's database (the cloud - their servers -
whatever)!

Why is this even worth it? Just because you can render your knowledge pretty
(with nice font, big and bold headers and images)?

------
4684499
I don't know how you guys think of this, but putting personal stuff into the
cloud, aka others' computer, without encryption is not looking so personal to
me.

------
hypersyntax
For those looking for an opensource / self hosted alternative, for the past
year i've been using MarkdownPages.

[https://github.com/unicate/markdownpages](https://github.com/unicate/markdownpages)

Backend is just a folder full of markdown files and has search as well.

See [http://unicate.ch/markdownpages](http://unicate.ch/markdownpages)
Password: demo

------
trilinear
Great idea, and I would like to use such a service. One thing - you may want
to address the issue of asking for a password on the home page registration
form over a non-secure connection.

It wasn't until I hunted for a secure form via the 'Login' link that I knew I
could sign up without risk of my credentials being sniffed.

------
aagha
What's the benefit of this over something like Google Keep or Evernote?

One thing I think could be interesting is if you let me own my data; not in A
ToS, but actually let me host my data: Either in my own MySQL instance or
Google Drive/Dropbox[0].

[0]Yes, I understand that with a service like Drive/Dropbox I don't own my
data.

------
tomhenderson
Really cool. A couple of things I'd like to see would be:

\- Change the window title to something other than 'Dashboard', and add a
favicon.

\- Give me a way to get my data out. Dropbox syncing would be great - a folder
for each category, and sync .md files into the folders. (Two way syncing would
be even better)

------
jchampem
I'm developing a small tool that covers the same use case.

There is not as much features, but it's open source and self hosted.

[https://github.com/jchampemont/notedown](https://github.com/jchampemont/notedown)

------
redcalx
I installed dokuwiki on a raspberry pi and forwarded port 80 through my router
so I can access it from anywhere and send links to others.

Oh and there's a dns entry setup using duckdns.org, which is free, although I
did send them a small donation (in bitcoin!).

~~~
geppetto
Same here: dokuwiki on a cubieboard and dynamic dns. Very pleased with that
solution!

------
johnmaguire2013
I like this. Critiques / suggestions:

* Esc should close a modal (hit "+", then hit Esc)

* On that note, more keyboard shortcuts would be great

* #hashtags should be recognized and linked in notes, or some other way of easily linking concepts together should be available

------
mrwnmonm
"human knowledge is cumulative" implement this idea by encouraging users to
make public posts, then other users could search through them and fork them,
this will be very good

------
cad
Front page is not behind ssl and you can sign up from there. It's easy to
change form action target to a malicious url with a simple mitm attack.

------
cad
Ok since nobody asked.. What is the tech stack behind?

------
livid
DO NOT USE IT FOR ANYTHING IMPORTANT.

It just can't save Unicode characters, anything Unicode will turn to question
mark ???????? junk.

~~~
siavosh
Hi Livid, just sent you an email. Unicode is now supported, thanks again for
pointing this out.

------
zsupalla
siavosh, this looks great - I think this would be super useful for a team
(especially with slack integration), are you or will you be looking for beta
testers for a corporate solution?

~~~
siavosh
Definitely, please send us your contact information: hello@faqt.co

------
mc_hammer
i tried the share link at the bottom of the page and it doesnt work. probably
because im not logged in? Idk i was expecting a demo :)

cheers. was looking for an app like this a few weeks back as well.

------
perfunctory
So, given that it's free, what is the business model?

------
FilterSweep
This looks great but it's 100% a UI sell.

------
cad
a favicon would be nice. It's easier to locate the tab that way especially
when it's pinned. (firefox users)

------
arcade


