Show HN: ThinkType – Write Down Your Thoughts | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: ThinkType – Write Down Your Thoughts

thinktype.app

45 pointsamadeuspagel38 comments

I'm looking for a quick notepad, so that time between having an idea and writing it down is minimal, like using a camera on a smartphone. App is a must, because I have a phone nearby most of the time. In terms of UI, I don't want to select note, name it, I just want to open it and write like in a paper notebook. Digital is better because you can write in one hand in public transport. Ideally this app is just blank space and cursor is automatically placed one line after previous note — so I don't have to tap screen and double enter to skip a line.

I use Drafts app for this. It’s in my dock. Tap icon. Type text. Swipe and select where it should go: Evernote? Idea journal? Dynalist? Email? Clipboard? You name it.

Amazing, thank you. That’s 90% what I’m looking for.

One thing though: it saves previous text in separate “files”, could I turn this off?

I found it: set new draft creation to never.

Markor and Syncthing works well. Better than Dropbox Paper because it works when there is no connectivity.

As a fastmail user I like the notes feature.

> App is a must, because I have a phone nearby most of the time.

Thinktype is a progressive web app, you can use it much like a native app, it works offline.

> In terms of UI, I don't want to select note, name it, I just want to open it and write like in a paper notebook.

Thinktype works just like that. You open the app and start writing.

I tried Thinktype on my iPhone — added a shortcut to homescreen. 1) I need to tap screen to start writing 2) I need to save what I wrote — can autosave happen in a browser app? 2*) Save button moved off screen to the right 3) I think new text should be at the bottom like in chat apps, but maybe it's just my taste 4) I presume it wouldn't work offline?

> I need to tap screen to start writing

I think the issue here is that, though the cursor is in the searchfield, the keyboard doesn't appear? I have no idea how to handle this. Even if you could make the keyboard appear automatically, it's also not obvious that you would want to, because you might just want to read your notes. (And then how to make it disappear?)

> I need to save what I wrote — can autosave happen in a browser app?

I've thought about that. Some issues:

- In thinktype, you write and search using the same field. So autosave would also save every search.

- The notes id is the time that you saved it. Not sure how I would handle that with autosave.

> Save button moved off screen to the right

Wow, that sucks. Can't replicate that, no idea what might cause that. Can you post a screenshot? Is the issue that the entire thing is too wide? Is it possible that you zoomed in by mistake?

> I think new text should be at the bottom like in chat apps, but maybe it's just my taste

I've thought about that. In my view, that makes sense at best for one line texts. If you have longer texts, and you want to read through all of them, then you have to keep moving back and forth. Scroll through a note to read it, scroll up again to find the previous note, and so on.

> I presume it wouldn't work offline?

It does work offline. Notes are stored locally using IndexedDB, and the code is stored locally using the cache interface of the service worker API.

> It does work offline

That's very nice.

> In thinktype, you write and search using the same field

For my use I wouldn't care about search much. Most of what I write is one-time information like a phone number or some shopping list. Sometimes it's a thought that I just want out there but it has no value beyond that moment. And if an idea can be used in some of my projects or become a seed for one, I'd want to catalogue it using a structured app like Evernote or Standard Notes or any other.

> Can you post a screenshot? Just sent you in an email

> For my use I wouldn't care about search much. Most of what I write is one-time information like a phone number or some shopping list. Sometimes it's a thought that I just want out there but it has no value beyond that moment. And if an idea can be used in some of my projects or become a seed for one, I'd want to catalogue it using a structured app like Evernote or Standard Notes or any other.

I think there are lot of advantages of using one app for all notes, and that's part of why I made thinktype. It means you don't have to ask yourself where to write something down and where you did write something down.

> Just sent you in an email

Thanks. So it does look like the entire thing is too wide. I have no idea how to fix this, or even replicate it, sorry.

>I think there are lot of advantages of using one app for all notes, and that's part of why I made thinktype. It means you don't have to ask yourself where to write something down and where you did write something down.

That's the idea behind most note-taking apps like iOS notes or Bear or Google Keep. You can use tags, ad images, lists and so on and so on.

But I dig that there are no folders or separate notes in your app, just one roll.

There are seperate notes, but no folders. You don't need or want folders if search is so easily accessible. Typing "foobar" to see all your notes on "foobar" is faster then clicking on your "foobar" folder.

I use an existing product for this exact purpose: Google Keep.

($insert_your_favorite_hate_for_google_products_here /s)

I used Google Keep for a good while and it was so useful that I became afraid that they would discontinue is so I decided to drop it first. Now I use org-mode with orgzly and that's plain text so no such fears.

nope, no hate for google keep. i just hope they dont make it go away. really useful for all sorts of notes/lists

Look it is not perfect now, but this is really good area to work on and innovate. Don't be discouraged by people comments, try to find group that will like this.

Thanks. I'm not discouraged, I did get some positive comments, and anyway I mainly work on it for myself.

Here's a hot take that most people here won't agree with but the query commands for sorting is hard to use because it forces me to remember them. If I forget, I have to reread the paragraph which slows me down.

This is bad UX because it's increasing my cognitive load to use the interface instead of reducing it. It's much better to offer toggle buttons for sorting.

I thought about that and actually had toggle buttons before. But there are some advantages to the "syntax" UI:

- You can use the keyboard. Couldn't you use keyboard shortcuts? Not that easy in the browser, because most shortcuts are already taken, and though you can override them, that also confuses people.

- You always see in the searchfield what search mode you're in. The buttons would have to be in the sidebar, which isn't always visible, depending on how wide the window is. And even if it's visible, you still have to look there, whereas you're already looking at the searchfield.

And it's not that hard to remember, it's kind of mnemonic: Exclamation mark to sort by priority, because you use an exclamation mark at the end of a sentence to mark it as important. Star to sort by changes, because when you change a file in a terminal text editor, you see a star next to the name. I should probably explain this in the app.

ThinkType also has a kind of help UI. If you hit F1, you see the keyboard shortcuts in the sidebar. (Only works if the sidebar is visible.) Should also explain the query syntax there.

> I should search my todo app and my notes app.

> What magic character did I have to type again?

> I should press F1 to figure out.

> What was the thought again?

You don't have to type any magic characters to search. You only have to type magic characters if you want your results sorted differently.

Interesting but I have thoughts away from my main work machine, does this allow sharing between mobile and desktop?

No, not yet.

This is a good idea and I hope to see that evolve. Any thoughts on how to export the notes?

Thanks. There's an export button in the sidebar. (If you don't see the sidebar, it's because the window isn't wide enough. It should appear if you zoom out. Not ideal, I know.)

Yeah didn't see that on my phone at all. Glad to see it is here.

Quite a few things out there that can manage that, I’m currently using FSNotes on iOS, but for years I used simplenote / notational velocity - as easy as it gets for data entry

Thinktype works a lot like notational velocity (write and search at the same time), but it's actually even easier because it doesn't have titles. You can write the entire note from the searchfield. (I'm comparing it to a web app inspired by notational velocity here[1], never used the original because I don't have a mac.)

[1]: https://notational.co/

Suggested feature: export as a plain text file like https://www.editpad.org

Love the simplicity, does it store the notes in local storage?

Thanks. The notes are stored locally with IndexedDB.

Out of curiosity, how does it handle the storage limits imposed by browsers? I've had a lot of ideas for browser apps that use things like localStorage but got demotivated by the low storage limits. It's fine if ThinkType doesn't address it, but if it does I'd like to know how.

It doesn't use the localStorage, it uses IndexedDB. (It's a bit confusing since IndexedDB also stores data locally.) The storage limits for IndexedDB are far greater[1]. I've used it for a long time and I have thousands of notes, never had any problems.

[1]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/IndexedDB_A...

Nice try, Mark, I won't fall for it

This is a great idea

Thanks.

Sure, trust my thoughts to the web...

Your thoughts are stored locally.

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