
Manifest: An instant grid-based pinboard for note taking in the browser - andreypopp
https://www.manifest.app/
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jonathontoon
Hi all, I'm Jonathon, the maintainer of the Manifest repo. Thanks to whoever
linked it here on Hacker News, I was wondering why it was get more attention
that I expected...Appreciate the support and feedback thus far!

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benjaminjackman
One minor suggestion: _just in case you haven 't considered it_, is to `favor
undo over confirmation`. So when the user deletes a note, instead of asking if
they are sure with an alert dialog, just delete the note but also have an undo
buffer (or trash can) so they can restore it easily.

~~~
jonathontoon
Someone suggested this recently. My personal thought on it is not to try to be
too smart and over-engineer things. Relying on a browser's native dialog
system simply just works and doesn't really need to be maintained. Doesn't
mean it will always remain this way, that's just my current attitude regarding
it.

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mosselman
Delete with confirm gives you a far worse UX than undo does though.

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LoveMortuus
Also having the confirm there, kind of disrupts the flow. At least for me,
your mileage may vary. Cool website though.

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sfRattan
This is a great little tool!

The subtle grid reminds me, oddly perhaps, of OneNote. It was my favorite note
taking app in college, and there was an implicit/invisible grid at the base of
every page with similar click and drag boxes for text and other media. Ever
since 2018 when Microsoft began removing features (i.e. local notebook
support) and stopped updating the full desktop version, I've been searching
for a viable replacement and debating just building one myself. The continued
free availability of the depreciated desktop app has stopped me from taking
the plunge, but OneNote is no longer something I expect to count on forever.

There's definitely a crowd of people who like visual note taking apps with
just a little bit of organizing framework. And there's definitely demand for
that kind of application.

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kompressor
Hi - I’m on the OneNote team. We’re bringing the full desktop version back
into active support and development (announced at Ignite in Nov). We made this
decision after hearing strong and consistent feedback from customers like you.
Hope to keep you as a fan!

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tsukurimashou
I did something similar a few years ago, I used markdown inside my notes so I
could put links / images and format the text easily.

The notes were also stored on a mongodb, so they can be accessible from
anywhere.

The only thing I was a bit stuck on, is when you define a grid size, it is
quite hard to make it work anywhere, especially if you have big differences in
resolution between your devices.

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keyle
Nice work! Safari is kind of limited with it, it takes a few clicks to create
a note, sometimes(?)

Also a no-select might be good for certain part of the page, or for the ones
not being edited presently, as text selection seem to grab most of the page
text at any click and drag.

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jonathontoon
As the original developer on this I was building everything on Windows so
didn't have Safari immediately available to test on. I'll take a look though
and make sure improvements get made if needed!

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gen_greyface
Feels great, but is there an option to switch out of the dark theme or is it
the only one

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rochacon
Yes, press Alt+T :)

[https://github.com/jonathontoon/manifest/blob/c51828086d972f...](https://github.com/jonathontoon/manifest/blob/c51828086d972f4aa1332e7a545b334f11dc2345/src/js/index.js#L441)

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keyle
If you're going to have obscure shortcuts, may I suggest that you document
them part of a note somewhere maybe accessible via a '(?)' icon at the bottom
of the page?

Also, your dark mode is way too dark and contrasted. Consider something like
this:

[https://imgur.com/a/8FLdGb5](https://imgur.com/a/8FLdGb5)

HTH

~~~
jonathontoon
Dark mode was just added over the weekend, so there's probably a better way to
address how to find out about features, shortcuts etc as they get built.

As for the contrast I think it's just a case of visual style preference. I
think the current contrast works for now but it's only been out for a little
while, so happy to see more responses down the road.

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dang
We changed the URL from
[https://github.com/jonathontoon/manifest](https://github.com/jonathontoon/manifest)
to the project page.

