[HN Gopher] /tap - Powerful and customizable note-taking system ___________________________________________________________________ /tap - Powerful and customizable note-taking system Author : jermaustin1 Score : 156 points Date : 2021-12-23 16:13 UTC (6 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.tatatap.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.tatatap.com) | csbartus wrote: | Great stuff !! It's juicy. Basic features, at first sight, which | prove very useful and extensible, customizable at a second read. | Things you don't think you need, but it would be very nice to | have. | | I use plain markdown + folder structure because I have nothing | better (I left Obsidian after an update made all my notes | unavailable). | | If there is a note-taking service to subscribe for, this will be. | The only impediment, for now, is that I'm making notes in the | editor, not online and/or via messages. | optymizer wrote: | I follow an unwritten rule that I will always congratulate anyone | on shipping anything. Shipping anything is hard and deserves | praise, so congratulations! | | Unfortunately I'm also realizing that I got to a point in life | where I just roll my eyes when I see yet another note-taking, or | to-do app, or any other spin on the same trivial problem that we | solved 1000 years ago and now are just beating a dead horse, | almost like a developer endlessly rewriting a piece of code to | make it perfect instead of taking the old "it's good enough" | approach and moving on to fix the other problems in the codebase. | | The note-taking apps are good enough. Even pen and paper is good | enough. | | I know I shouldn't react like that, because it's not fair to the | author - they had an idea for a better product and worked hard to | ship it, and probably learnt a ton along the way; maybe they'll | even make a good chunk of money, but is there no point at which | we're allowed to say "You don't get much praise anymore because | you're the millionth developer who figured out how to duct tape | some methods written by others to create a weather app. We | collectively ran out of praise for solutions in that specific | problem domain. And we're sure as hell not paying for it"? | | I feel like everyone's just trying to make a buck with their tiny | spin on the same idea. Of course there's a subscription on the | note-taking app. And let me guess, the next note-taking app is | going to have more real-time interactions, and fancy animations, | and it's going to sync with the notes your cat takes and you can | print them out once a month on this slick looking notepad that | gets mailed to you. | | I hate that I ended up old and cynical. I used to have starry | eyes. | dmje wrote: | Congratulations are indeed due, so ditto there. | | I have to say I have the same response - dammit, not another | one - but I'm rather more interested in our complete | fascination with these tools. Like - I have my note taking / | knowledge stuff pretty much nailed [+] but STILL I always find | myself clicking through on posts like this. Like many others on | HN, I'm absolutely, unbearably, totally addicted to considering | and re-considering my methodology in the notes / to-do space, | _even though I 'm really happy with what I've got_. | | When I try to analyse this I realise there's a part-dopamine | level thing (I love a beautiful, clean UI and idea), partly a | wishful thinking (man, if only I could remember X, maybe this | is the tool to help me!), and partly (this is the hard one to | admit to but I would bet money on many other HN types as being | here with me) an addiction with _process_ , pure and simple. | Anything to not actually have to DO that thing I need to do - | oh look, I could review a tool that'll help me procrastinate a | while longer. | | It reminds me of the me when I was 16 and "revising" for GCSE | exams. I spent about 90% of my time re-formatting and colouring | in my revision timetable rather than actually doing the work of | revision. That me is still here, only now it's notes apps | rather than colouring in... | | Finally - I think admitting that there simply isn't a perfect | tool that will enable All The Things and Make Me A Much More | Effective Person is much, much harder than the alternative | which is to keep the Holy Grail somewhere in my consciousness, | and keep on clicking those damn notes app links :-) | | [+] In case anyone cares, I've used them all but I'm really | happy with current 3-pronged approach: Evernote for transient / | meeting / throwaway notes. TickTick for to-do's. Dokuwiki for | longer term / journaled / documentation type stuff. All | connected together via the common beauty of hyperlinks. Hook | for Mac is amazeballs for this... | xpressvideoz wrote: | I second TickTick. I've used tens of to-do apps and it | reasonated with me the most. | interleave wrote: | Oh my, I've gotten similarly cynical as of late for practically | the same reasons. | | But before anything else, congratulations on the launch! | | I've narrowed down to pen and paper[^1] and Obsidian for later | remixing and publishing[^2] | | Having gotten used to how _usable and fast_ pen and paper is, I | wanted the same feeling: Take a quick markdown note while | working without having to keep Obsidian running in the | background, switch to Obsidian to write and to leave my | keyboard. | | None of the existing note-taking menu bar apps[^3] had what I | needed. So I made my own that fits my needs perfectly[^4]. | | A single global hotkey [?]-[?]-N opens the note popover, [?]-S | saves the note into my Obsidian vault. | | If you want, check it out! It's the simplest, least-frills way | I could come up with to jot down a markdown note | | [^1]: My pen and paper notebooks: | https://publish.obsidian.md/alexisrondeau/%E2%AD%90%EF%B8%8F... | | [^2]: My digital garden: | https://publish.obsidian.md/alexisrondeau/ | | [^3]: Note-taking Menu Bar Apps: | https://www.macmenubar.com/note-taking-apps/ | | [^4]: QuickDown.app: https://github.com/akaalias/quickdown | RivieraKid wrote: | > I feel like everyone's just trying to make a buck with their | tiny spin on the same idea. | | Lol, exactly. My first thought after seeing the landing page | was "there has to be a Pricing link in the top right menu". | | From a rational perspective, there's absolutely nothing wrong | with people wanting to get financial reward for their work. But | subconsciously there's something about it that really annoys | me, I'm not sure what. | verifex wrote: | I know what it is, it's the idea that someone can write code | once, and someone else should pay to maintain it forever | using a subscription model. The craziness of this space is | that people think that maintaining a tiny footprint on a | server somewhere is somehow worth $10 a month boggles my | mind. You can buy access to most basic file-syncing services | for that much. Why isn't a note-taking app, even a very | advanced one, not just a simple one-time payment? If you want | to haggle about paying for new versions, sure, but most of | the "services" space is full of rent-seeking people, which is | probably the thing that rubs you the wrong way. | | Another way of thinking about it: Most MMORPGs that charge | monthly fees are around $10 a month too, does a note-taking | app somehow involve as much work as maintaining the massive- | infrastructure and maintenance nightmare of running a MMORPG? | If not, why is the pricing so similar? | blippage wrote: | > The note-taking apps are good enough. Even pen and paper is | good enough. | | It works for me too! I have a working piece of paper that I jot | down notes on, plus whatever I need to do. If the "to do" is | "long-term" enough, I have a lined A4 piece of paper for this | purpose. I add it to the list. | | For note-taking, I write stuff down in my "lab book", or on my | personal website. Easy. | | It's like the time I cobbled together a couple of ESP32's to | act as an alarm system. The problem is, the Wifi was a bit | marginal, and Wifi is always subject to drops anyway. My dad's | solution: use a whistle. | haswell wrote: | The note taking space is interesting to me. You say the problem | is solved, and yet, every time I see a new app in this space, I | perk up because I hope that maybe this is the one that will | resonate/work for me. | | Note taking is a deeply personal process. Physical notebooks as | a medium are infinitely flexible but apps are not. This means | that 100 different people writing notes on paper might be doing | so in 100 different ways. | | I'd argue that this is why this is such a crowded (or rich) | product category. | | I often find that <very popular "ultimate" note taking app> is | not for me, and I find myself hoping for something that fits my | particular needs and habits. I've occasionally thought about | trying to build my own. | | All of this to say: I don't think the cynicism is needed here. | Even if this is a solved problem for you, it's not for all of | us, and I think the evidence that this is true is found in the | fact that developers keep looking for new ways to solve this | problem. | loceng wrote: | I've come to think the missing piece is a system or process | of helping each person experiment through different note | taking styles or systems, until they find what resonates best | with them, or exposing them to various systems, different | ones which they may realize work best for different contexts | of what they're doing - for different projects or mental | contexts, etc. | | I too have an idea for a "note taking" app - essentially | better streamlining, automating, and extending what I | currently do - but maybe the process or steps I currently | take are integral to what I currently do working. Who knows. | Will I ever get the chance to create the custom "note taking" | app that I envision? Who knows. | | For now, because of my situation with severe chronic pain and | how it impacts/disrupts my executive function, I will have | multiple TODO lists on q-cards, and dozens and dozens TODO | lists in various notes on my laptop and phone, none of which | are synchronized - most of them lost to the past and | therefore inherently part of a backlog of relatively | unimportant things that otherwise would surface again in my | mind or life if they were important enough. | optymizer wrote: | I have to say this makes sense to me, and I've always known | that I'm just not in the target audience for these apps, but | if you'll allow me to poke some fun at your comment for a | second, I'd paraphrase it as "my note-taking needs are so | intricate that nobody has hit the right spot yet. I need a | perfect soup of features coded and exposed to me in just the | right way so that when I finally write down a note I have a | mental orgasm" :) | | Joking aside, I personally think it's more important to focus | my attention on the substance of the note, rather than the | process of taking the notes, though the two aren't in | conflict with each other, except for the times when they take | away from your time and mental bandwidth. | joe8756438 wrote: | Totally! I made tap and I still use org-mode for a lot of | stuff! I think we all think slightly different things when we | hear "notes" It is both an artifact and also a system for | capturing the artifacts. the artifact is often, but not | always, just some boring text -- but the way it is captured | and used can be really interesting and as varied as the | artifacts themselves. _so. many. possibilities._! | tsuujin wrote: | I'm an avid org-mode user, all of my work happens there. | | Can you give me the elevator pitch for why I would pay for | tap over my existing org-mode + captures + agenda? | joe8756438 wrote: | Not really. But _some_ part of my motivation to build tap | was the difficulty convincing anybody to use emacs. | | Here are a couple points anyway: | | - I love getting email summaries of different note | categories. I email myself a list of all my programming | related reading saturday morning, it's great. | | - Entering a quick note via sms is hard to beat, | especially because /tap sends me text messages every day | and so it's always pretty high up on the recent messages | list | | edit: formatting | User23 wrote: | I think there is probably some opportunity for an Emacs | distribution that is specifically targeted at these | potential users. However, not as a way to try to get them | to join the Church of Emacs[1]. Emacs would be no more | than an implementation detail for a great note taking | app. I imagine something along the lines Nicolas | Rougier's notebook-mode[2], but without the focus on | literate programming. Just nice formatting, quality | variable pitch fonts, and familiar keybinds. Maybe some | kind of slick configuration of artist-mode too. | | [1] Of which I am a proud member, btw. | | [2] https://github.com/rougier/notebook-mode | mcbishop wrote: | I assume most note-taking apps originated with someone | figuring out what system / process resonates for _them_. But | ultimately that system / process is optimal only for that | person. I've given up on adapting an off-the-shelf app... in | part because I lack the self awareness here to know what's | optimal for me. It's only in the process of working it out | for myself on a basic canvas (e.g. a spreadsheet, text files, | pen and paper) that I'll have any idea what will work and | stick. I'm many iterations into that process. I'll look to | /tap for inspiration! It looks awesome, props. | MR4D wrote: | My opinion is slightly different - I don't think note taking | is about the _app_ , but rather about the _process_. Because | of that, all of us will always be looking for something to | make that process something better than we currently | experience. | | To me, it's either paper, Notepad(or any simple text app), or | Excel. Everything else is about the process. | | But then, maybe I've become old and crusty and just don't | know it yet. Sigh. | heresie-dabord wrote: | > Note taking is a deeply personal process. | | Yes. All the more reason _not_ to encumber it with large | dependencies, proprietary code, or fragile, transient | technologies. | | I switched to using git as a repository of structured notes. | The schema is simple. I can pull notes to various machines, I | can archive the repository, I can track changes. | | "Everything should be as simple as possible and no simpler." | -- attributed to a rather good physicist. | prometheon1 wrote: | It depends on the definition of a simple thing. Is your | system so simple that you could teach your parents how to | use it? | heresie-dabord wrote: | The process requires typing a note using the keyboard and | then pushing the new/revised text to git. Git works on | every computer and CPU architecture that I have used... | and I have used a wider variety than most. | | If one's parents are the acceptance testers for | usability... I think I might recommend that they use | something that they understand fully. That might be git, | but it might also be a Moleskin notebook and an ink or | graphite writing instrument. ^_^ | prometheon1 wrote: | Ok I agree, different types of people have different | kinds of systems that are the most simple for them. But | in that case, is it also possible that for some people | the most simple system has a lot of large dependencies? | (Maybe people who are young, used to writing by typing on | a smartphone, not used to pen and paper, and never used | git or a command line) | friedman23 wrote: | Note taking is solved, find me an app that solves note | organizing and note retrieval and I will pay for that | hanche wrote: | I wonder sometimes if note organizing isn't a lost cause. If | we could just solve note retrieval, who cares about | organizing? I want to make a note when I find out something | useful, and I want to retrieve that note when I need the | information (or when I find out more, so I can amend the | note). Organization seems orthogonal to that desire. | humblepie wrote: | I like seeing new ideas, and I'm one who has already settled on | one note-taking technique. Discovering new ideas helps me | incorporate new methods and also see some flaws to my | techniques. That's all fine. | | It's understandable we sometimes feel fatigued on watching | these assembly-line of apps coming our way, but it's new ideas | and not products that excite me. | joe8756438 wrote: | Thanks! I made /tap and I agree with a lot of what you're | saying. The thing is, working on tap has been and continues to | be fun! I think there are so many note-taking apps because a. | they _can be_ easy to make and b. because everyone has their | own way they want to take a note. I think of tap less as a | note-taking system, more like the system to make the system. | Sure there's a long way to go to _fully_ realize that, but I | think we're headed in the right direction. | | I like seeing tap used for stuff I didn't anticipate. And | that's what it's all about for me. Like, you could just use the | API and never log into /tap at all. | | Also, maybe you're not into this kind of thing, how many note- | taking systems have S-expression formulas that support nested | functions? | smoldesu wrote: | > how many note-taking systems have S-expression formulas | that support nested functions? | | Obsidian, Workflowy, Roam Research, Dynalist, Quire, Asana | and Org Mode, just to name a few off the top of my head. | ModernMech wrote: | The flag made of hands is a thing out of my nightmares. | BergTheBold wrote: | I don't see where to submit a service request. There are errors | in the browser console when I log in: TypeError: Cannot read | properties of undefined (reading '$router') at app.e2dbfb1e.js:1 | at h (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at r (chunk- | vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at Nt (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at | e.zt.confirmTransition (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at | e.zt.transitionTo (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at se.init | (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at Cr.beforeCreate (chunk- | vendors.439a26c5.js:35) at ie (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:41) at | Hn (chunk-vendors.439a26c5.js:41) | BergTheBold wrote: | I'm still very interested in the service, though, and I'll | probably continue to check in on it. | joe8756438 wrote: | hello [at] tatatap.com shoot me an email, we'll sort it out. | pugworthy wrote: | There are so many, "the best note taking/whatever thing ever" | posts, I just don't read them anymore. It's a saturated market at | least for me. | | * edit * I see I'm not the only one | subhro wrote: | Another subscription.... | | _sigh_ | CalebAzunobi wrote: | Nice | prezjordan wrote: | > S-expressions in the equation example | | Yes. | | > You already have the app. Save notes to /tap via text message | (SMS), the website or a bookmarklet. | | K now I'm actually going to use this. Nice work. (Good landing | page!) | joe8756438 wrote: | Thanks :-) | nonethewiser wrote: | I have completely ditched note taking systems in favor of a flat | structure and strong search features. I just make a bunch of .md | files and edit them in vscode. | rPlayer6554 wrote: | If people are interested, Joplin is a great FOSS note taking | software built on markdown but adds e2e encryption, a web | clipper, a nice desktop UI, Integrated syncing (you can use | Dropbox or something like that, or pay for their service), and | more. The mobile app needs some work, but overall I like it. | codazoda wrote: | I like the approach to plain text or .md files but for some | reason the tool being in the web browser makes me much more | productive. I suspect it's because I'm already in the browser | all day. | | Because the browser makes me so much more productive, I built | my own second brain software tool and I posted it as a Show HN | yesterday (it's a rough first go). | | https://joeldare.com/i-built-my-own-second-brain-software-to... | [deleted] | Waterluvian wrote: | I do this. I also have a small plugin that causes F6 to pull up | scratchpad.md | keithnz wrote: | This is what I do, and I use Obsidian as a layer over it as it | is designed with this kind of structure in mind. You aren't | locked into it in anyway. It even has a Vim mode. | riffic wrote: | you may be interested in these then (vs code plugins): | | * Foam - https://github.com/foambubble/foam | | * Dendron - https://github.com/dendronhq/dendron | | Obsidian is great as well, but there are caveats that may make | it not so great with your preferences | mstngl wrote: | And not to forget LogSeq (https://logseq.com) which is often | mentioned in a row with the above and somehow the new kid in | town. Works with local markdown files but lives in your | browser (so useful even in environment with low privileges). | Allows linking and querying notes and blocks swiftly. | [deleted] | chrisweekly wrote: | Been there. Consider looking at Obsidian, which is a great | client operating on local .md files (which you could still edit | in VSC -- tho you'd be missing out). | novok wrote: | I think the key issue with notes that you just edit in plain | text files on your computer is the lack of sync, mobile access | and access to a quick ui on the mobile side. | qbasic_forever wrote: | Syncthing solves the markdown sync issue for me flawlessly on | every platform. You can always use Dropbox or any other plain | old file sync service too (OneDrive, NextCloud, etc.). At the | end of the day it's just a bunch of files so you can use | anything--sftp, rsync, xmodem over dialup... it's just files. | mempko wrote: | LISP in your notes? That's cool. For my note taking I use the | great tiddlywiki. A lot of features seem to overlap with the | tiddlywiki. What seems nicer is the syntax, which is cool. As a | tiddlywiki user, what's the advantage of this note taking app | over that one? | | (https://tiddlywiki.com/) | joe8756438 wrote: | I'm not sure, just seeing tiddlywiki for the first time now. | Two of the main goals of /tap are having your notes meet you | where you are: sms, email, API and introducing elements that | allow you to consolidate other applications into tap: beans, | formulas, events etc. | mempko wrote: | I see you are the creator of /tap? Great! I think the multi | modal goal is definitely cool and could be really useful. For | tiddlywiki, I have to host my own server and only access to | it is via a browser. While I have access everywhere this way, | it's sometimes slow on mobile phones. | | FYI, I signed up but login doesn't seem to work for me. Does | nothing. I had to verify my email but got a 'oops try again' | message with the verify link. Maybe has something to do with | not being able to login. | joe8756438 wrote: | Email me at hello [at] tatatap.com and I will sort it out | for you. | qbasic_forever wrote: | This is a hosted service so you can just access it and | read/write your data from anywhere. With tiddlywiki you need to | go through a lot of machinations or even run your own server to | access it anywhere. | mempko wrote: | Yes, it being hosted is definitely nice. It's not a big deal | for people like me that know how to host software but I can | see that being a huge plus for folks who can't/don't want to | manage their own server. | pedrovhb wrote: | I've been thinking a lot about this lately. I've been using | todopy (which works on the todo.txt format/spec) to manage tasks, | and hledger to manage finances, and after having tried a myriad | of solutions for organizing life, it seems it's these simple CLI | tools with text-based formats that work best for me. | | This product kind of feels like that, but without the main | upsides (easy extensibility, you own your data, it's all | accessible locally so latency is non-existent). I don't really | see much benefit vs having local files backed up by GKeep and/or | a VCS instead. | | Still might steal some of the ideas, though. In particular, | tracking events is useful ("when was it that I last had to order | gas again? Do I need it soon?") | joe8756438 wrote: | I release the parser open source https://github.com/tatatap- | com/sowhat it could be a nice overlay on top of a local plain- | text note-taking solution | dysoco wrote: | You might be already be aware of this but you might want to take | into account the fact that many countries do not use SMS at all, | first because it's non-free/expensive and secondly because people | have just grown used to not even realize it's an option. | | Here in South America it's ALL Whatssapp, I don't think I've ever | sent an SMS in 10 years. | Naac wrote: | The same thing is unfortunately happening in the US. I would | assume that iphone to iphone communication over imessage also | does not go through traditional sms. | joe8756438 wrote: | Noted. FWIW SMS is not a requirement to use /tap. And I would | love to build more messaging integrations. email me with | suggestions! | junon wrote: | Whatsapp has a business API pretty much exactly for stuff | like this. | dysoco wrote: | With WhatsApp you already cover probably 90% of Latin America | and Europe; Telegram would be really nice to have since it's | gaining traction and it's popular among tech-savvy users. | | Russia and Asia probably use other apps like WeChat, honestly | no idea. | danShumway wrote: | There's some very cool ideas here, I like the approach it's | taking with composability, it's an interesting project. And the | integration into other systems seems kind of inspired in some | ways, getting a summary email or doing stuff with text messages | seems gimmicky in theory but I bet it actually feels great and | ends up being useful in practice. Probably a lesson there about | the benefits of integrating with multiple systems/primatives that | people already know how to use and build on as a way of | encouraging them to be more flexible/creative. | | However, and it's a big however: | | Speaking as someone who once did a ton of handwritten notetaking | in OneNote, and then realized that the export options at the time | made it practically impossible for me to carry those notes | forward as my setup evolved, and that I was about to potentially | lose somewhere between 1 to 2 years of my notetaking life, the "I | need to know that when I put my brain in this that I can get it | back out" worry is pretty real. | | It's not even just data export, OneNote had this cool thing where | it would search the text of handwritten notes, which encourages | you to take handwritten notes. It's great because handwritten | notes feel good to write but are disorganized, so you could kind | of bridge the gap. But the problem is that then even if you do | get the images out, all that functionality is gone suddenly. So | similarly, lets say I do use an API to back up all my notes, am I | going to build extensive infrastructure around integrating with | SMS and a CLI that all just gets thrown away some day? | | After OneNote, it's very hard for me to consider using a | notetaking app that doesn't talk about its data format/export on | its homepage. Digging through the blog posts, I can see some talk | about Open Source data formats, which is good, but only partially | assuages my fears. But in general, /tap is immediately talking | about REST APIs on its homepage, which, cool, I do think that's a | cool idea. Is there actually an overlapping Venn diagram between | people who are using a note system that's so comprehensive it's | sending them text reminders, and people who know how to make REST | requests, and people who _aren 't_ very paranoid about owning | their own data? | | I pay subscriptions for other people to host stuff that I don't | want to dig into the technical weeds for; I pay for Wallabag | hosting because I have stuff to do with my life that doesn't | involve running security updates on a Wallabag server. I'm really | happy to pay for services like that, especially if its in the | $1-10 a month range, which /tap is. But importantly, I _could_ | self-host Wallabag if I needed to, today, without losing any | functionality and without needing to rebuild any of my | infrastructure that integrates with Wallabag. I could migrate my | data both to the new self-hosted service or to a competing | service, or I could even pay _another_ 3rd-party to host Wallabag | for me again, and point my URLs to their servers. So I don 't | have a bunch of hesitations in the back of my mind about giving | someone money to host that kind of service because it's less of a | risk to do so. | | On the other hand, with /tap, with a system where I am literally | putting part of my brain into the computer, I think I need | stronger guarantees about how it's going to work and what will | happen after it gets bought by Google. | joe8756438 wrote: | I hear you. What guarantees about how it works do you have in | mind? | | You may be interested in just the parsing component of /tap, | which is open source https://github.com/tatatap-com/sowhat | danShumway wrote: | I did see the parsing component, and it looks good. My worry | though is that even with the parsing format being good, | you're not really selling this as a parser; it doesn't seem | like the text format is the most exciting part of this. | | With notes in specific, because they're such an important | part of my life, I'm taking a very long-term view; what still | exists after 15 years? Everything else is kind of ethereal | and doesn't matter because I can't really invest into | building systems around something that will disappear | suddenly. So I look at /tap through that lens: what parts of | this still exist if tomorrow the developer either gets bough | by Google or joins an Amish community? | | It seems like it's only the parser? Not the SMS stuff, not | the visualization or searching, not emailing, not how the | ledger works, not the API. And again, it seems like a good | parser, but I already have some decent parsers I use for | taking notes in text format, that's a somewhat crowded space | that's hard to compete in. | | ---- | | I may not be the kind of customer you are trying to target, | and that's fine, but I'll try to explain more clearly what I | mean. | | When I think back to OneNote, I built systems around | something that stopped working for me, and then those systems | all had to be rebuilt from scratch. It was a huge loss of | time investment that outweighed any monetary investment. If | I'm thinking long-term about my notes, I'm paying $7 for... | basically just document storage, I can't really build around | the API or the SMS or email integration, because that stuff | doesn't exist in a permanent form, it's all ethereal and it | all goes away if you join Google. In some ways it's even | worse than that, because the focus on SMS integration means | I'm likely to get heavily reliant on SMS for notetaking, | which is a huge issue if I ever need to self-host anything | and realize suddenly that building apps around SMS handling | is very difficult. I've now kind of accidentally made my life | much harder. | | But I compare that situation to something like | Matrix/Wallabag, apps where prices for official hosting are | basically in the same neighborhood as /tap and that cost me | very similar amounts of money to subscribe to: | | - I'm getting a lower barrier of entry that means I can start | relying on the project before I ever learn anything about | hosting. | | - I'm getting the chance to build infrastructure around an | actively supported piece of tech, where I don't have to solve | all of my own problems. | | - I'm paying for short-term uptime guarantees. | | - I'm paying to have to think less about security. | | - I'm paying to not have to think about the horror of | integrating with SMS/Email notifications | | In theory, I would be paying for the same stuff in /tap, but | in practice I'm not because the SMS features and integrations | and stuff don't actually exist in the long-term. Everything | except the parsing format is ethereal and is going to go | away. | | So I have a short-term uptime guarantee from /tap that's | higher than my own would be, at the cost of needing to redo | my entire infrastructure and needing to figure out hosting | from scratch in the future. I can think less about security | right now, at the cost of needing to build my own product | some day where all of those security problems will come back | in full-force even worse. I have a lower barrier of entry | now, but later on I have to drop everything and start from | scratch, and I won't be able to really do anything with my | notes when that happens other than parse them until I rebuild | my own solutions for stuff like repeated tasks. I can build | infrastructure around an actively supported tech stack, | except that tech might all vanish one day, so I can't | _really_ rely on any infrastructure that I build, or on any | other service that relies on /tap. | | ---- | | It's difficult to put into words, but I want to feel like I | am paying for a service, not for a technology. With | Matrix/Wallabag/insert-whatever, I get to temporarily not | think about problems that are annoying, but I could think | about them if I needed to. If something goes wrong, I could | even pay another person to think about them and keep putting | that problem off. And that means the service is just making | my life easier, I'm just paying for people to solve problems | for me and to deal with things I don't want to deal with. I'm | paying for someone else to help me use a piece of technology. | | In contrast, with /tap, I'm paying for access to that | technology just as much as I'm paying for any service, which | far from solving problems actually introduces problems in my | life, because it would add new API requirements for whatever | custom solution I'll need to eventually build when the | company pivots or gets bought out or dies. | | In a weird way, because notes are a long-term investment, the | exclusivity around the tech means the value proposition for | me as a user is much lower than the value proposition from | more open applications, because kind of summing up everything | above, a concept that encapsulates a lot of these ideas is | that I'm paying for _peace of mind_ , I'm paying to have | someone take my worries away and to stress about stuff like | hosting for me. And /tap's approach to peace of mind seems to | be "don't worry, you can rebuild everything yourself if | something goes wrong." The only way I'd get peace of mind out | of that is if I paid you for hosting and then only used the | REST API and only after reimplementing the entire REST API | myself locally. But it's not worth $7 a month for me to do | that, I want solutions that I don't have to plan around a | bunch, I want solutions that don't give me anxiety when I | think about the future. Parsing is a very small part of that, | I'm not really worried that no one would be able to figure | out how to parse a documented text format if /tap went down, | I'm worried about everything else. | | Again, I am probably not your ideal customer, so I think take | that with a grain of salt. But my perspective is that I want | a service that makes me feel more confident about the long- | term, not less. I feel like if I was setting up auto- | responders or integrating Tasker with my SMS app on my phone | around /tap -- I don't think I'd feel confident about any of | those systems, /tap seems to be encouraging me to build some | very long-term fragile solutions/integrations for my | notetaking setup. | fellowniusmonk wrote: | This is the most similar note taking app to my long term note | taking app I built for myself. Very good! | johnchristopher wrote: | Ooh, interesting. Leveraging SMS mass pricing with shot commands. | Brings back memories from the before Smartphone era. I wonder if | this could take off with people so used to GUI now. | anonymouse008 wrote: | The _only_ issue I have yet to solve with SMS is security. They | are by nature completely and totally open... and there doesn 't | seem to be a good fix other than sending encrypted text, which | defeats the purpose of the convenience of SMS | nixass wrote: | If there's "pricing", "plans" or "subscription" tab on the | website I will ignore the tool 100%, especially for this purpose | xanaxagoras wrote: | Looks interesting. However, no more subscriptions. I only use | FOSS software or software I can buy for money. | claviska wrote: | I sympathize with this. But as an open source author, I | encourage folks to at least occasionally sponsor some of the | FOSS packages they heavily rely on. | | I love open source, but I also pay for apps and services that | provide me with more value than what they cost. I'm not sure | this provides me with that value, but perhaps to some it does. | | Regardless, if software boosts your productivity, free or not, | it's worth at least a few bucks to subscribe or sponsor and | support the authors. | MandieD wrote: | Amen to that - if I use something, I'm happy to _buy_ it, or to | make a one-time donation to a project, but no more | subscriptions. | jetrink wrote: | Provided the SMS features are core to the system (and it looks | like they are), then this is more of a service than a software | product, in my opinion. It's surprisingly expensive to send or | receive a text message - about a cent[1]. A light user would | cost them about $0.50/month and a heavy user would cost them | several dollars. I don't know how you could provide that | without a subscription. | | 1. https://www.twilio.com/sms/pricing/us | joe8756438 wrote: | The parser component of /tap is open source | https://github.com/tatatap-com/sowhat if you already have a | plain-text solution you may find having a quick way to parse | utility elements is a useful addition. | lostintangent wrote: | Congrats on the release! I _really_ love the simple approach this | tool takes. Though personally, I view note taking as "commodity" | enough, that I prefer to own my data, and use my existing editor | setup. If folks are looking for a productive, yet low-ceremony | note taking workflow, GitHub.dev might be worth a look, since it | provides the benefits of using Markdown, a GitHub repo, and VS | Code, all from the browser: http://aka.ms/githubdev-fun, | https://twitter.com/lostintangent/status/1429483662257446916. | | I also _really_ like the concept of "spells", so congrats on this | experience as well. It would be interesting to explore | implementing the same behavior using GitHub Actions (many of | which, probably already exist?), with push/cron triggers. The | benefit of that is that you could share your note taking workflow | as a repo template, and then others could fork it and be up-and- | running without any new accounts/tools/etc. | austinvhuang wrote: | I'm working on local-first OSS for this sort of second brain | thing called OpenMemex. The data store is sqlite (wasm/rust | frontend) with programmable integrations in mind: | | https://github.com/austinvhuang/openmemex | lostintangent wrote: | Looks really interesting! Thanks for sharing | asleepawake wrote: | This reads like the reply to the Dropbox release. | lostintangent wrote: | Is cloud storage anywhere near as opinion-inducing as note | taking workflows though? :) There are like a dozen new | entrants each month, and so it's probably meaningful for | folks to get super clear on their core requirements. | Otherwise, you'd spend all your time evaluating tools, as | opposed to actually writing. | avrionov wrote: | How do you access your notes on mobile? | qbasic_forever wrote: | Look into gitjournal if you're storing and editing markdown | from git repos: https://gitjournal.io/ It's very nice in my | experience. | lostintangent wrote: | Yeah GitJournal is great. I used it for a while, and the | dev is super responsive and awesome. | lostintangent wrote: | It's a little bit clunky, but you can use GitHub.dev/<repo> | on your phone. I do a lot of browsing/quick edits that way, | and it works well enough. That said, I also use Working Copy | for iOS to sync my notes repo, and will use that sometimes as | well. | | Personally, I don't find that I do a lot of "deep writing" on | my phone, as opposed to quick recall or in-the-moment scratch | padding. So as long as I have a way to access my notes, make | quick edits, and then sync them with my laptop (where I'll do | my primary thinking later), then I'm pretty content. | beebeepka wrote: | Open a text file. Enter text. Save with a proper name. Done. | | No need for connectivity or any additional complexity | mteoharov wrote: | After signing up for a trial I went to input my phone so I can | use the SMS feature and there is this: "*Currently only | supporting US phone numbers.". It would have been nice to know | this prior to signing up. | joe8756438 wrote: | Noted. Feel free to email me at hello [at] tatatap.com we might | be able to figure something out | joe8756438 wrote: | Hey HN, | | Creator of /tap here. Thanks for all the great discussion! If | there's anything I can answer related to the product, process, | reasoning, where /tap is headed LMK! | jonititan wrote: | Were you inspired by Zim? | | https://zim-wiki.org/ | zcmack wrote: | a subscription to a notes service that is intentionally more | barebones than the other options is something i really don't | need. currently using joplin and its been working pretty well. | ithkuil wrote: | I like the reminders spell. Unfortunately it works only with SMS | text message and only US is supported, which means I can't use | this product :-( | | Why not reminders by email? | joe8756438 wrote: | Yes. It will happen. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-12-23 23:00 UTC)