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Comment by tobr | Hacker News Reader

I’m intrigued by Roam, but I can’t see myself using it as long as it’s browser & cloud only. Also, good typography and visual design is critical in any kind of note taking app, but in Roam that barely feels like an afterthought.

Something like this but as a plain text based, native Mac/iOS app with stellar typography... that would be a dream.

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Ditto. I was actually thinking of trying Roam until I read there was no mobile app. I like the idea of a “second brain”, but for me that has to be something that never gets detached from my first brain. It has to be accessible at all times, for both reading and writing. I currently make do with Apple Notes, but I’m interested in finding something more organized…

A second brain should also be as private as my first brain – ideally end-to-end encrypted, which I guess Roam is not if it’s a webapp. Too bad. (Apple Notes isn’t end-to-end encrypted either, but that’s another reason I’m looking for an upgrade.)

I've been using Inkdrop, mostly because I like my notes E2EE. It's worth a look: https://docs.inkdrop.app/security

Even though it's a webapp it can be end-to-end encrypted. Fortunately, they are planning to do it, but I am not 100% convinced that all the function will work on e2e notes.

Just in case the NSA is keeping special tabs on your favorite recipes and approaches to meditation.

The NSA, or, y'know, the app's creators.

The product is improving quickly - I'm happy it doesn't have the weight of two native mobile apps to drag.

Seconded and I'm glad I saw this before I got too deep into it. I'm wary to try even something totally open source because of course their is the adoption cost (do you move all of your old notes over? do you have a split brain? Too much waste time in tiddlywiki for me is a harsh lesson).

That said, I still appreciate the effort people spend in thinking about these things, but a cloud-only offering (cloud-only and 3rd-party hosted, I should emphasize) is sadly not for me.

Yeah those are definitely the big limitations right now. From talking to the founder the desktop app is on its way, mobile will probably come later.

I've been using Drafts as a temporary holding spot for things to add to Roam when I'm on the go.

Dynalist offers free account and works offline on all platforms, and was the inspiration for Roam, one can also try that for that temporary holding spot.

> Also, good typography and visual design is critical in any kind of note taking app

The org-mode fanatics may disagree with this

Good typography comes in many shapes. If you use org-mode you can tweak it to your heart’s content.

Same with web app. I'm using Stylus for my own tweaks + Dark Reader.

Spacemacs org layer is a good place to start.

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