SOLVED Trilium - hierarchical note taking application with focus on building large personal knowledge bases

[necrevistonnezr]

Homepage: https://github.com/zadam/trilium
Screenshots: https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Screenshot-tour
Docker server installation: https://github.com/zadam/trilium/wiki/Docker-server-installation

Features

• Notes can be arranged into arbitrarily deep tree. Single note can be placed into multiple places in the tree (see cloning)
• Rich WYSIWYG note editing including e.g. tables and images with markdown autoformat
• Support for editing notes with source code, including syntax highlighting
• Fast and easy navigation between notes, full text search and note hoisting
• Seamless note versioning
• Note attributes can be used for note organization, querying and advanced scripting
• Synchronization with self-hosted sync server
• Strong note encryption with per-note granularity
• Relation maps for visualizing notes and their relations
• Scripting - see Advanced showcases
• Scales well in both usability and performance upwards of 100 000 notes
• Touch optimized mobile frontend for smartphones and tablets
• Night theme
• Evernote and Markdown import & export

Builds

Trilium is provided as either desktop application (Linux, Windows, Mac) or web application hosted on your server (Linux).

• If you want to use Trilium on the desktop, download binary release for your platform from latest release, unzip the package and run trilium executable.
• If you want to install Trilium on server, follow this page.
  • Currently only recent Chrome and Firefox are supported (tested) browsers.

[technotame]

This looks great, I'd love this on Cloudron.

[ultraviolet]

I have packaged this for Cloudron. I have been using the desktop version for sometime and the Cloudron app is the natural extension of the app. Providing a web interface and the full sync capability to and from the desktop app.

Repo is here

[Hillside502]

@necrevistonnezr
For "Trillium" read "Trilium" --- please edit this issue title accordingly.

[girish]

@ultraviolet thanks! i have marked this app as wip

[Captain Kirk]

I did a little research. As far as I can see, it could not handle PDF files. just images. Am I right or did I miss something?

[ultraviolet]

@Captain-Kirk nope it can manage pdf files too. Attach to notes it can't render them but you can version control open and download pdfs.

[Captain Kirk]

@ultraviolet Thanks! That would be enough for me.

[ultraviolet]

@girish I think this app is ready to roll for some more testing if you want to take the package for pushing to the store?

[girish]

@ultraviolet Yup, it's mind my list. Currently, finishing up vault.

[girish]

@ultraviolet Can you put in the license in this repo as well? I will take a look tomorrow and publish it.

[ultraviolet]

@girish will do sorry thought I had.

EDIT: license added to repo

[girish]

@ultraviolet Thanks! Published as unstable. New repo is at https://git.cloudron.io/cloudron/trilium-app . You should have access already.

[seeker]

Is anyone using this?

[imc67]

@seeker yes, I use it almost daily for capturing my notes during configuration changes / development in different “code languages” to create my own wiki with “how did I do that?” Also lists of frequently used commands etc.

[ruihildt]

@seeker Also using it. All my notes in there.

[seeker]

@ruihildt @imc67 Thanks. I do wish it had an android app. I guess I could copy to the Trillium using the web login. I am also considering joplin, which seems more rubust. Did either of you look at that?

[marcusquinn]

@seeker Joplin is the best of the FOSS option IMHO.

Personally, I'm all-in on Ulysses but that's Mac & iOS only, and closed-source and paid if that's an issue.

Otherwise, iA Writer is the best of the cross-platform, offline apps, bunch that I know of.

My main requirement is the .mk files retain their file names and folder structures in a way I can edit with multiple apps as needed, which Joplin doesn't do.

Atom / VS Code and a Git app like Working Copy is another way.

[seeker]

@marcusquinn I see. I can imagine how keeping the file names and folder structure intact would allow you to use any program to manipulate the files.

[ruihildt]

@seeker
When I started using notes, I wanted to have them as text files in order to have them in a simple format and find the editor that would feel the most natural for my workflow.

I have used Joplin, Typora, Zettlr, FocusWriter. And I settled on Joplin for some time. I think I moved out because of sync issues and also because the interface was a bit too terse for my liking.

I then tried Obsidian.md (and its extension) which blew out all of these, but unfortunately is not free software.

This experience changed my priorities, and I moved to Trilium because as it's not text based, you can use advanced workflow (for example, create everyday a note with the current date, but the best is to check out the demo content from Trilium), have notes appearing in multiple place in a tree structure (which I discovered was important for me) and is super scriptable.

Check out this mad person turning Trilium notes into a CMS: https://wingysam.xyz/posts/tePIFQKUbTQ3

I also hoped there would be an android app, but it's not the case. The mobile version is really usable though, so eventually I'd like to help make it a PWA.

[jdaviescoates]

@ruihildt said in Trilium - hierarchical note taking application with focus on building large personal knowledge bases:

The mobile version is really usable though, so eventually I'd like to help make it a PWA

I guess you could "install" it as a browser app so it has its own button and auto logs in?

I do this with lots of forums I use regularly.

[seeker]

@ruihildt
Thank you. Scripting is one of the things I see Trilium praised about. My understanding of scripting is minimal. But I understand enough to see how that could be a game changer. It is a matter of weather I would use the scripting. A few of the existing scripts might be useful enough for me to make the leap. But what about using it when away from my pc. I really need a way to bridge the phone and the pc with as little friction as possible. Being able to take notes while reading a report or reviewing a video or an audio file on my mobile phone would be extremely helpful.

Obsidian is pretty amazing. It is part of a broader evolution of knowledge management. I know a number of people who are using it and loving it. I have also heard good things about logseq and athens While plain text is future proof, it is difficult when working with video and audio files.

I discovered Codex I really like the freeform access it give to one's data- specifically multimedia. But I have not had a chance to look deeply into it. I suspect that there is a good chance it is not future proof.

@jdaviescoates A good idea. I think part of it is how easy it is to navigate while on a smartphone as well.

[jdaviescoates]

@seeker said in Trilium - hierarchical note taking application with focus on building large personal knowledge bases:

Being able to take notes while reading a report or reviewing a video or an audio file on my mobile phone would be extremely helpful.

I most just use Nextcloud Text docs!

[seeker]

@jdaviescoates Do you highlight, share and then post to the Next cloud doc?

[jdaviescoates]

@seeker no I don't do any highlighting. I just take notes in the Nextcloud Text app (but it do it locally just using gedit)