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Comment by ryloric | Hacker News Reader

I used to use it a bit to draw graphs, but I've since come across mermaid[0] and it's even better for this task. It doesn't have the kind of flexibility a mouse based tool like excalidraw has but it's faster and easier to use for me.

[0] https://mermaid-js.github.io/mermaid

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Since it's integrated in Gitlab's Markdown, I've used it for flowcharts and sequence diagrams, and I was very satisfied with it. https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/tools-and-tips/mermaid/

Mermaid is great. I remember sending a diagram made with MermaidJs to the security officer of a big retailer and the guy said that that was the tool (and the information) he wished he had the day he joined the company.

I am using PlantUML instead and C4 some time ago. Works very well inside VSCode, but Mermaid was quick.

I love mermaid charts and especially love that they integrate with my preferred markdown note-taking software: https://obsidian.md

Mermaid is cool. Excalidraw has fantastic obsidian integration too though!

oh nice, I'll have to see what plugins obsidian has for this.

Base obsidian should have mermaid charts unless I'm mistaken. It's pretty neat.

I love mermaid. I use this wrapper in R: https://rich-iannone.github.io/DiagrammeR/mermaid.html

Wow, its GraphViz reborn!

Long live `dot`!

http://graphviz.org/pdf/dottyguide.pdf

Yeah, graphviz is like 30 years old I think and it's pretty solid.

I think I finally settled on mermaid cause it fits flawlessly into markdown based writing or documenting software. I don't think it's anywhere close to dot in it's comprehensiveness though.

Dot rendering is ... primitive. And I need to install Ghostscript to render which always bugged me.

Mermaid looks far more modern.

I want to love mermaid so much... i've tried several times. It just hasn't gotten into muscle memory for me yet

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