
Trilium Notes: Markdown autoformat personal knowledge base - en3r0
https://github.com/zadam/trilium
======
Karunamon
I've been singing the praises of this app every chance I get.. it's really
pretty much perfect.

* Free (beer/speech)

* Self-hostable, including the sync server, which doubles as a web-accessible version of the app (++mobile access!)

* Extensible (want UI elements that do things with your notes? Easy. Want to render graphs based on metadata you've entered? No problem. Your own metadata and tagging scheme? All built in.)

* Encryptable (built in encrypted notes function)

* Syntax highlighting for most languages you probably care about

* Exportable, no proprietary formats

* Notes can be written in markdown

* Truly cross-platform (Mac/Linux/Windows/Web)

The tiniest of gripes can be directed at things like requiring you to use a
key combo to insert a link (rather than letting me, say, use some markdown and
autocompleting it), but that's _minor_. This blows the Evernotes and the
NValts and quite possibly even OrgMode out of the water.

~~~
Yanu-3452
My biggest gripe trying it now is the poor keyboard shortcuts in windows.

Hitting ctrl+s is a reflex and while it might not need saving, it's annoying
that it redirects focus to the search.

Likewise, F2 doesn't rename, instead tries to do something difference.

If it proves useful anyway I'll try to contribute a keyboard shortcut map to
be more consistent with windows or VS, it might be annoying until then
however.

~~~
e_carra
I think this is done specifically for Emacs users, since we're used to get
incremental search once we type C + s.

------
souterrain
I find that an ability to search the knowledgebase exceeds the value of
organizing according to a hierarchy. I can see some value in
linking/backlinking à la an encyclopedic "See also" reference for discovering
similar information that doesn't share keywords.

Are there other disadvantages to an "all search" solution I'm overlooking?

~~~
marvinblum
We went for search with Emvi [1]. There are people who like hierarchy, but I
think if you don't know what you're looking for you won't find it in a
structure anyway. Except everyone on the team or you personally put a lot of
thought into it. A hierarchy does not scale well. We tried to make the search
as powerful as possible. With filters that can be combined to filter the
result set, but I mostly use the textsearch as it is good enough.

Im still thinking about how we could add "explorability". Sometimes you just
want to click around a bit and explore what's there without any real goal in
mind. Let me know if you have an idea on how the system could support that.

We are rebuilding the UI right now to put an even stronger focus on search.
You can read about it here [2] if you like.

[1] [https://emvi.com/](https://emvi.com/)

[2] [https://emvi.com/blog/a-new-experimental-user-interface-
QMZg...](https://emvi.com/blog/a-new-experimental-user-interface-QMZgmZG1L5)

~~~
slightwinder
> A hierarchy does not scale well. We tried to make the search as powerful as
> possible. With filters that can be combined to filter the result set, but I
> mostly use the textsearch as it is good enough.

Does it support dynamic hierachies? A Hierachy where each level is the result
of a search/filter on the parent-level?

~~~
marvinblum
Hm I haven't heard of this term before but it sounds like it. The filters are
additive, which means you reduce the result further by adding more filters.
You can for example filter for a tag, add a group to filter for authors and
then search through the remaining articles by text search.

I haven't found this feature to be that useful all the time, depending on the
amount of articles you have. This is why it won't be in the new UI on day one
(but will be re-implemented later, the backend is still there). You can find
almost anything by using a few keywords, which is how I navigate Emvi right
now.

[Edit] We have the plan to add configurable dashboard filters, which use the
filters to show a subset of all articles, tags, members, groups and lists you
like. I guess that's closer to what you described.

------
formalsystem
I've tried more than a couple of times to use a personal knowledge base and
haven't been succesful in making it stick.

My process so far has been I keep a daily journal where I write down the most
interesting things I learnt or did everyday. If my daily notes are getting
unwieldy then I use a Markdown file which I sync on Github. And when I really
want to make sure that I've understood something I'll either write a blogpost
or stream myself going through a library.

I would definitely appreciate the ability to search my old notes better since
they got too long to efficiently parse a long time ago but this process lets
me structure the really important concepts I learn without adding too much
overhead when I'm just learning random stuff. I also expect my notes to
outlast many knowledge base projects and part of the appeal of markdown to me
is that it's probably gonna be around for a while.

I'm curious if any writers here have found personal knowledge bases to be
worth the initial overhead.

~~~
bwat49
> My process so far has been I keep a daily journal where I write down the
> most interesting things I learnt or did everyday

Trilium should work great for this, you can press ctrl + alt + p to
automatically create a new day note under a calendar tree.

In my case, I also added a custom shortcut/button that brings me to the
current day in the calendar tree

------
munfred
I have installed trillium twice before, when trying to find a better
alternative to a bunch of google docs, but didn't end up using it. The reason
is that you cannot readily share an editable copy of a document with a link,
which ends up happening with half the documents I write in Google docs. If
that was an option, I think it'd be preferable to Google docs in every way
(for me).

~~~
yasoob
This makes me wonder if there is feasibility for P2P collaborative editing
feature in trillium.

~~~
The_Colonel
It is actually explicitly a non-feature:
[https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/FAQ#multi-user-
support](https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/FAQ#multi-user-support)

------
mkl
Previous discussion (but worth discussing again):
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18840990](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18840990)

~~~
mbreese
I think this is more in reference to yesterday’s discussion about Obsidian...

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23324598](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23324598)

There have been a few knowledge base/markdown discussions lately.

~~~
synista
I wonder whether it is a result of coronavirus and lockdowns, spring cleaning,
or the popularity of roam (or all of the above).

------
threatofrain
Latex status:

[https://github.com/zadam/trilium/issues/287](https://github.com/zadam/trilium/issues/287)

------
arauhala
This looks pretty amazing, and something I have hoped would exist.

I wonder if it would make any sense to add Jupyter Notebook kind of
functionality to these kinds of notes. It feels like super cool idea, but it
may be too big feature to be realistic.

------
en3r0
I have been using Trilium lately and I love it. What sold me completely is the
sidebar sections "What Links Here" \- my purposeful linking and "Similar
Notes" \- reminding me of what I may have forgotten.

~~~
en3r0
Also the fact that I can completely self host it on a server while running a
local client on any machine that syncs effortlessly.

------
fsiefken
Interesting! Tiddlywiki with all of it's plugins, tags, search amd markdown
support is still preferable to me. It is even more crossplatform as it works
locally in my Quest as well (termux webdav rb script)

~~~
mcint
What is your current setup?

I quite happily and successfully used MPTW to manage work knowledge, tasks,
and context for 2 years. Between leaving the related job and the odious save
workarounds for pre-TW5 wikis, I stopped using it. I've made multiple multi-
hour attempts to find a workable TW5 configuration, with both the TW5 legacy
plugin and searching for replacement plugins.

~~~
ahnick
Not sure if you have run across NoteSelf
([https://noteself.org/](https://noteself.org/)) before, but it is basically
TiddlyWiki + PouchDb. Maybe that would be a workable solution for you?

------
The_Colonel
Author here, if you want to ask anything ...

~~~
tritiy
Well, my questions are pretty basic but since you offered :) 1\. In text note
I make a code block and I do not know how to 'exit it'. How can I 'finish' it
and make another paragraph? 2\. Is there a shortcut to insert a checkbox (like
Evernote does with Ctrl+Shift+C 3\. Is there a way to change the font? I like
Mono fonts for notes. 4\. Can I reduce the margin between paragraphs in text
notes?

Thats all for now, thanks.

~~~
The_Colonel
Hi, sorry for being late:

1\. Code block is exited by double enter (so two new lines)

2\. No shortcut for the checkbox unfortunately

3\. Only Themes can change the fonts - see e.g. "Steel Blue" in the demo
document to see how it's done.
[https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Themes](https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Themes)

4\. You could use custom CSS to change it however I can't recommend this:
[https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Themes#custom-
css](https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Themes#custom-css)

------
oonis
Can anyone compare this to Obsidian that was released into beta recently?

~~~
drcongo
I've tried Trilium in the past, and tried Obsidian this week. I fell in love
with Obsidian instantly (even though there are a couple of key things missing
[1]). This is entirely subjective, but the UI of Trilium actually gives me
anxiety - I want my note-taking, knowledgebase to be a zero-friction thing of
calm. Obsidian definitely is, I spent two minutes customising keyboard
shortcuts to closer match Sublime Text where I spend most of my day and I was
up and running, and in the flow when writing documentation. Trilium is the
exact opposite of that. It's information overload. It reminds me of MS Word
with all the toolbars open. Some people like that, but if you like a calm,
focussed place to write or read documentation or notes, I'd go with Obsidian.

[1] For me Obsidian is currently missing anchor linking to headers within a
document (which I know is on the roadmap), and scroll past end of document, as
I hate my carat being anchored to the bottom of the screen when writing.
Despite those things being missing, I'd paid the personal license within about
an hour of trying it and if it turns out to be useful across a team I'll pay
the commercial license for it too.

~~~
synista
+1 re: information overload.

I've been testing a bunch of them lately, and Zettlr (FOSS) has a nice and
minimalist thing going on too. I liked Obsidian too, especially the network
graph, but the licensing discussions in the other thread yesterday are a bit
of a concern, but the dev erica seemed fairly open, so I'm keeping an eye out
on how that goes.

~~~
en3r0
There are a few things to address the default overload.

\- There is a "writing mode" \- You can hide the sidebars or portions of the
sidebars.

------
kurzawa7
Will give this a shot. Looks like a modern alternative to CherryTree. I find
these hierarchical note taking apps useful for organising complex projects
which usually require several levels deep of note organisation. I also use
Joplin for general note taking and Google Keep for website resources. I'm set.

~~~
maxwellwhite
Website resources?

~~~
kurzawa7
What I meant by "Website Resources" is a collection of website links I want to
keep note of.

Also, Sorry for not linking apps I mentioned.

CherryTree - A hierarchical note taking application, featuring rich text and
syntax highlighting, storing data in a single xml or sqlite file.

[https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/](https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/)

\--

Joplin - An open source note taking and to-do application with synchronisation
capabilities

[https://joplinapp.org/](https://joplinapp.org/)

\--

Google Keep - a web-based note-taking service developed by Google.

[https://keep.google.com/](https://keep.google.com/)

\--

Extras which may interest you:

Zim - A Desktop Wiki - [https://zim-wiki.org/](https://zim-wiki.org/)

TreeSheets - Open Source, Free Form Data Organizer (Hierarchical Spreadsheet)
- [http://strlen.com/treesheets/](http://strlen.com/treesheets/)

~~~
maxwellwhite
Hey! Thanks for the reply, by the way. Checking out the links, too!

------
acemarke
Been using Boostnote for the last few years. Boostnote's great, but it doesn't
have note nesting / trees, so I figured I'd give Trilium a shot.

Downloaded Trilium, tried to type in a standard GFM Markdown fenced code block
with a language identifier for syntax highlighting, and it kept converting it
to a "Plain Text" block as soon as I typed the third backtick, making it
unusable.

That's a hard blocker for me. I write Markdown all the time, and I don't want
a pseudo-WYSIWYG editor mangling the Markdown I'm writing as I type it. I also
need to be able to add code blocks, with highlighting, at any point in the
middle of the notes I'm writing.

------
NotUsingLinux
Is anyone reminded by this as kind of a smalltalk image?

I mean an environment that is self contained and can be modified?

I wished the authors would think of aspects like that: how to modify the
system without restarting it or needing separate tools.

Sure it looks nice but in the end its a browser with some javascript libs
glued together with sqllite or something?

Customization seems way to difficult , so the tool can do a bit of tiny things
that seem nice for me but so many things that I don't need. The GUI seems very
bloated for me.

Is this just me? Or are people generally happy with such GUIs?

~~~
bwat49
I'm very happy with this program, the GUI isn't the most elegant but it does
the job.

I don't think I'd describe the GUI as 'bloated' though... it's actually pretty
minimal. I think the screenshot on the github page makes it look busier than
it really is (e.g. the sidebar can be hidden, and you'd usually be using it
with a larger window size).

I find the program to be very powerful out of the box, so I haven't had to
customize much (the customization is just icing on the cake IMO).

I use this program every day at work as my personal knowledgebase for my
technical support notes (and also for taking notes on phone calls). I have
thousands of notes and this program handles it much better than anything else
I've tried. The powerful tree structure, fast search, and tagging system make
it really easy for me to quickly find what I'm looking for.

------
elmolino89
While this is clearly aimed at personal use, I wonder if it could be extended
to serve as a lab notebook for a small research group.

Storing time-stamped, signed Markdown notes with version control and with some
hierarchy (daily notes, brainstorm ideas, versioned lab protocols etc.) would
be great.

Right now I use on site GitLab & private GitHub repo, but for the not computer
savvy users this seems to be too much. Ability to add images to documents
using menus/mouse is crucial.

~~~
camone
As referenced above [1] multi-user is a non-feature so I wouldn't expect
development on that any time soon.

Not sure how good Obsidian [2] is, multi-user support seems to be in dev as
well but it might work on a shared drive folder. Also doens't seem to be
free/libre.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23347168](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23347168)
[2] [https://obsidian.md/](https://obsidian.md/)

------
znpy
oh my god this looks awesome... i had been using boostnotes, but this looks
lightyears ahead.

------
munfred
I have installed trillium twice before, when trying to find a better
alternative to a bunch of google docs, but didn't end up using it. The reason
is that you cannot readily share an editable copy of a document with a link,
which ends up happening with half the documents I write in Google docs. If
that was an option, I think it'd be preferable to Google docs in every way
(for me).

------
pricci
I would love to explore someone else's library of notes. I really don't know
how to take effective notes. When I start reading a new book I try to take
notes but always end up just reading. The problem is that months after I can't
remember much.

~~~
synista
Look up Andrew Matushchak's entry on evergreen notes [1].

[1]
[https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4SDCZQeRo4xFEQ8H4qrSqd68ucp...](https://notes.andymatuschak.org/z4SDCZQeRo4xFEQ8H4qrSqd68ucpgE6LU155C)

~~~
pricci
Thanks, that's really interesting

------
strogonoff
Another hierarchical note-taking tool slash knowledge base, though a bit more
limited/opinionated and proprietary, is
[https://roamresearch.com/](https://roamresearch.com/).

------
kaushikt
Looks like Obsidian.md

Currently, I use a lot of Notion. Easy to share and collaborate.

------
majkinetor
Looks great.

I couldn't use anything tho, that has no export as single portable format
(PDF, Word, whatever) of complete stuff.

~~~
IanCal
Seems to have an export to a tarfile of markdown docs with a folder structure
matching the tree.

------
aryehof
I wonder how important keeping data local versus in the cloud is for users?
Does encryption affect that?

