I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

[Dormouse]

Lattics still going well. But I perceive a need to rejig my security system. I currently use encrypted folders and files; this works well enough but accessibility is high friction and notes etc are also vulnerable when they are opened.

My needs are relatively simple - I doubt I need much more than links, tags, tables, images and attachments. I'll cope with markdown if I have to but rich text is preferred because of colour. And I don't expect ever to have a huge volume of notes in it. My list of candidates quickly reduced to Standard Notes and Notesnook.

My preference is probably Standard Notes: it's been going longer and was taken over by Proton last year which ought to give it the edge in hardening expertise - and it's based in Switzerland. I do note though the lack of development since the take over and criticisms of the tables implementation. And the price is high. I don't want to justify that for what will be low volume use. I do also note that both Proton and Standard Notes typically have big Black Friday/Cyber Monday offers and that those discounts then roll on so long as the subscription is maintained. There's an expectation that there will be some sort of joint Proton/Standard subscription plan but so far nothing has been announced formally; Proton Ultimate subscribers have been given substantial discounts on request.

Notesnook stores notes in Germany but the developer is based in Pakistan. More whizz bang than SN, as if it wants to compete with mainstream notes apps but with a security USP. But cheaper, and considerably cheaper if you're in education or comparing with SN prices without discount. Notesnook also has discounts from time to time, but the discounts don't rollover.

I've dabbled mildly with both in the past but the free versions are missing features required for substantial use. Feels as if you have to be in properly to get a true feel about them. My current plan is to subscribe to Notesnook and then have a look at SN/Proton pricing around Black Friday, keeping my eyes open for anything that arises before then. Unfortunately export/import between SN and Notesnook appears not to be straightforward and easy.

[Dormouse]

Update on Proton/Standard Notes/Notesnook

Come Black Friday offers, I'll subscribe to Proton Ultimate.
A couple of months before that I might subscribe to Standard Notes - as a trial with the intention to cancel and then resubscribe (or not) on Black Friday. I need to be much clearer about how it will progress in the future under Proton's ownership; I'd like to see more development; given the current climate, I'd prefer to have the option of using European servers; I'll want to see that it's at least as good as Notesnook.

Notesnook has the virtues of the curate's egg. It's belief in privacy and security appears to be a core belief not an addon; it's open source. otoh the value of open source depends on the number of good eyes inspecting the code, and it's a relatively small app. It only has three coders in total. The last update included fixing a security weakness they were told about. There are some nice security related features like their monographs (encrypted shareable notes). The overall design is pretty standard. But usability isn't great and the UI seems relatively poor. Maybe I've just been spoilt by the apps I have been using recently.

It's currently working on keyboard shortcuts. It does have some, but many commands can only be accessed by mouse. Now I'm far more mouse oriented than most on this site, but the mouse suits some commands, depending on the workflow, and not others. The relatively new command palette helps, but involves a lot of scrolling and doesn't include all commands. And documentation is virtually non-existent; there is a (limited) online help document - but I only discovered the trigger for the command palette by reading some comments made when the feature was released. No wikilinks. It doesn't parse #tags written in the notes - you have to use the apps own tagging workflow. Search is unsophisticated.

I'd find it unusable - compared to many other apps - if I were trying to use it for all my notes. But I'm not, so I can live with it - but am very open to alternatives. And I will continue to use a security and privacy oriented accessible notes app. I have found it liberating to have one available. My previous system was secure, but the friction meant that I often didn't take notes or tucked them away in imperfect containers like password managers. So, whatever Notesnook's imperfections, it's better than that.

I've seen Anytype suggested as a secure notes program. I don't see it like that. It's interested in security, and data is encrypted and can be local; its AWS servers are in Switzerland. But although the data is encrypted, the indices are not. I suspect other features, eg collaboration, are as important to it as security. I also find it convoluted.

20250302 094751 UPDATE EDIT
Barely a couple of days later there's a few updates.

I downloaded latest version of NN (update button and auto mechanism reportedly not working on v3.0.28), and then switched to the beta channel - so now on 3.1.0 - beta.0.

There's a considerable change in the UI layout, and overall it's a considerable improvement. And there's now reportedly a keyboard shortcut for focus mode - though I can't remember what it was supposed to be (and it's not one I personally need).


Also a SN comment that though there's no feature updating currently, they are working with Proton on improving the backend

[Dormouse]

I have now written a number of notes in NN. Despite the UI improvement, it's still not close to the same class for usability as Lattics and Tangent. I semi-regularly moan to myself about some perceived deficiency (eg tab won't indent a paragraph - if I want similar functionality I have to use bullets; getting into a focus mode is cumbersome). Sometimes I want to just write the note in something else and then paste it in; Proton Docs isn't too bad for that (it would somewhat remove the point of NN if I used something less secure to write the original before pasting in). But it's okay.
I'm not entirely sure SN is okay. The free version is very limited and I have no desire to use it. Quite a few negative comments keep floating too. Including once when the sync server was down for quite a while (NN's monograph server has been down once for a few hours only). Communication with the user base doesn't seem great rn. But we'll see.
Proton Docs (pale imitation of google Docs) seems functional.

One similarity I have noticed between Lattics and NN is the primacy of the individual notes. Folders (aka documents or notebooks) exist, but it's as easy to put a note in multiple folders as it is to give them multiple tags. And the views are very similar. I have a suspicion that many modern apps are designed in this way.
One difference between them is that NN is very responsive to users, while Lattic's Discord seems abandoned and that's the only public communication channel I know of. But Lattic's development is coherent and seems to be following a clear plan and purpose, while NN's feature list seems random, apart from the security emphasis which is its purpose. I'm not convinced that user requests are the best way to enhance usability - every user wants something different.

[Dormouse]

I have always been aware of the importance of forgetting.
And of minimising cognitive effort.
And yet notes programs tend to focus on total recall and users often choose high effort strategies for managing their notes. Brute force rather than optimised effort.

My mind was drawn to this by a Reddit query from a user who appeared to systematically go through all the notes they had taken and classify or discard them. Wasting the effort in the discarded notes and losing the potential value to future needs.

I will massively oversimplify human memory:
Two main recall/memory systems: episodic/sequential and semantic/categorical. Forgetting avoids recall being clogged up by irrelevant memories - but this forgetting is more akin to fading losing the path than it is to wiping the memory out. Fading is governed by recency and frequency. Recognition memory is possibly used even more frequently in everyday life but needs the stimulus in front of us.

The highest brute force recall in programs is Search (but with the disadvantage that search terms need to be fairly precise). Folders offer Search within defined limits (but user has to know where the desired note is kept and there's often significant user effort in deciding where to put the note originally). Tags are kin to simple predefined Saved Searches and filters; they all depend on recognition of the desired note(s). The advantage of the tags etc system is that it also shows notes that are in some way similar - and notes are rarely wanted on their own. Effectively these are semantic/categorical equivalents.
Programs are less often designed to present notes in an episodic sequence. iirc the original Evernote was designed around it. The Daily Notes popularised by Roam Research is another way of achieving the same thing, but it only does this if all notes are in Daily Notes. Programs using Folders tend to put them into silos and so explicitly don't have a 'see everything in sequence' view. iirc Heptabase had such a view, but the best I have seen is in Lattics. This allows all notes to be seen as cards with view options for summary, summary with images, preview and list. The advantage is that it enables very fast visual scanning with notes being chosen by recognition. Sequence is by latest edit, so I have a recency effect as well.
Another feature popularised by Roam was wikilinking, where notes can be seen as a network of links from a note and backlinks to a note (similar to Luhmann's zettelkasten, but also reminiscent of the Citation Index tomes I well remember from academic libraries; many happy hours spent going backwards and forwards between papers and tomes until I had distilled a network of key papers, researchers and topics; computers just don't have the same aura as reference libraries and books, preferably tomes). Again, it's a typical feature of human memory where one memory will stimulate others to come forward.

Forgetting
Why exactly is forgetting important?
Primarily it's about resource management, prioritisation, and limits to attention and conscious thinking. It clears the memory and thinking palette of noise.
Forgetting is not about the deletion of memories; it's about making them progressively harder to access. The mind also needs to be open to random thoughts and submerged memories: wide open increases the potential for creativity; focus and trying to remember closes that shutter. Bringing one of those into the palette reinforces it and improves future accessibility.
The same factors are important with PKM notes.

But I know of no program that advertises its ability to forget. That's something the user has to devise for themselves - so long as they are aware that forgetting is important.
And the lowest cognitive effort way of doing this is by doing nothing where that is possible.
The difficulty is that most programs are not well set up to do useful forgetting. They either lose the note completely or render it inaccessible except through a very time consuming search process (ie high effort). Because of its fast scanning through episodic notes, Lattics offers another way of finding untagged, unfoldered notes. I only tag or link notes when I know I want that route and at that point it's very easy to do.
And from time to time I delete tags that I know I won't need in the future. The underlying notes are unaffected but there's less overhead when scanning the tag list.

The scanning with Lattics only works for me because I use a large monitor (8 cards on one row) and many of my notes are visually distinct. I'm not sure it would work with the other notes programs I am familiar with. Obsidian probably - but the tweaking is the very definition of high cognitive effort. But I'm sure something similar could be done in some other programs. Maybe the whiteboard notes programs. I assume that the next way of doing this will be using AI.
The system is different to zettelkasten (which has it's own semi-forgetting system - where notes have a parent but no children, are never referenced by any other zettel, and aren't indexed) and structurally different to the process I previously diagrammed (the actual process is somewhat similar but the cognitive effort is much reduced, and the overall structure is essentially flat).

[Dormouse]

I've just come across a browser designed for research, that solves my biggest problems in some areas and will be using it forthwith.

It's relatively new, still immature, has limited features and some points of friction; and isn't cheap ($60 a year atm). No tabs. What it does have is "trails" showing all the websites and notes made in lines of research; these can be exported to markdown (and later reimported if wanted). The searched sites can be opened from the links in notes programs that understand markdown.

It's particularly useful for recording unsuccessful searches since they tend to be left out during normal note-taking and it's easy to find yourself going in circles over ground you have covered before (you=me). This browser solves that problem. It doesn't have many other features, but those it does have are very useful (dark reader, ad blocking, focus mode); it's very comfortable to work in.

I'd say that it's particularly suitable for research where you try multiple searches trying to answer one question (such as genealogy/shopping research etc) but mightn't be particularly advantageous if you are doing wide searches for many different things. It's also more effective if you are already using a notes program that understands markdown links.

https://gethorse.com/

 https://www.youtube..../watch?v=7gvxrieLvII

I've written A review of my experience with Horse. Suffice it to say, that it didn't go according to plan.

[Dormouse]

The outcome of my Horse ride was that I switched to Vivaldi as my research browser. I've used it on and off for a long time, and I've tweaked my settings to give me the best approximation of trails. The times I switch away are usually because I hit problems with one or two sites or that I get irritated by some aspect of its default behaviour (and tweaking its settings is always a deep dive).

But given my frequent focus on note-taking, why wasn't its notes feature a stronger draw before?
A question I needed to ponder.

I think there were a number of factors.

• Vivaldi is a browser with notes; it makes no attempt to incorporate PKM features - which means it can be a starting place for notes but not the final home. And there are many ways of taking notes on websites.
• The organisation it does have is with folders, which don't map on to my preferred system.
• There's no automatic link between the website and note; a link can be put into the note, but that's true for any system.
• Vivaldi notes aren't especially good for annotating a website; my interest is often in making a few comments rather than developing a complete note.
• The one program advantage relies on a screen large enough to accommodate both site and note.
• I hadn't thought of the trails idea for deep, iterative research..
• The advantage of taking the notes in Vivaldi, doesn't really extend beyond that particular methodology; it's perfectly okay for other notes, but no better than many other methods.
• And it's browser dependent, which means there would have been a different workflow depending on which browser I was using at the time.

[Dormouse]

Further Update on Proton/Standard Notes/Notesnook

I'm not sure that I will ever subscribe to Standard Notes. If I was going to use it, I'd want the rich text capability that's only available in the paid version; but when I read the Discord the whole thing seems frozen and not developing despite the existence of longstanding bugs. The developers have been working on the Documents feature in Proton Drive. I'll continue waiting for Proton Black Friday.

Notesnook continues to develop. It remains unintuitive and has multiple features and UI is often awkward. But it works. But feels like overkill since I will never use it for all my notes, which afaics is what most users want it for. I don't need high security for the vast majority of my notes; it would be a pleasant addon to a program that already did everything well, but I'm not going to sacrifice usability for it. And, when it comes to it, Lattics is pretty secure being entirely local with syncing through one of my cloud drives.

My best solution may not be a notes app at all. I have used Diarium for many years. It has some pretty nice functions and integrations that I do use. Notes can be tagged, and it works with markdown. Export is excellent. And a few months ago it tweaked its encryption system and is now as secure as any of the secure notes apps. I won't have enough secure notes to require a fully fledged PKM system to manage them.

[Dormouse]

Whiteboards

I mentioned in the Lattics thread, that I've been looking at using Milanote for brainstorming and thinking through a project. (Lattics has no whiteboard right now; what it has is much better for structured thinking through, but not ideal for me personally for brainstorming.)

I've always been aware that whiteboards suit me. I played with using OneNote; I worked with the Scrivener corkboard without ever finding it truly useful. I used the Canvas in Obsidian quite a lot, but it never quite had the features I ideally wanted.

Several years ago I subscribed for an annual licence for both Heptabase and Scrintal. I liked the description of Scrintal but it seemed to have been launched and sold without having full functionality and without even having the team of developers in place - and once they were appointed, the program seemed to gradually shift direction. Whereas Heptabase worked, was developing well and reasonably functional and intuitive to use, even if it wasn't quite what I had been hoping for. Both were supposed to be PKM note apps with notes on whiteboards, suitable for researchers, students etc. Scrintal rebranded as 'Playground for the Mind'. Hmm.

I never did use Scrintal much and decided not to take up the highly discounted offer of a lifetime subscription. I simply didn't believe that it would ever do what I needed, and wasn't that confident in it lasting long once it ran out of VC money. I notice that it closed its Slack community a few months ago.
Heptabase had a bigger user base, was developing faster and claimed that its revenues were higher than its costs. I stopped using it, and didn't renew my subscription, because it didn't have useful export functions (I particularly need Word formats) which meant that my notes had an awkward path to being used in my writing. It started to say that's its purpose was to support learning and currently describes itself as helping to make sense of your notes. Not the niche for me, but it has developed massively since I stopped using it.

Eventually I found Lattics which does what I need. But brainstorming, making sense  works best for me on a whiteboard. The Heptabase/Scrintal whiteboards were never actually good for that either being so heavily based around the actual notes; neither was a creative whiteboard.

So when I needed that whiteboard, I looked around: quickly discounted all the programs I had and turned to Milanote. I have used it before, but not often. Its functionality is entirely confined to being a creative whiteboard. It's a web app, with all the advantages and disadvantages of being a web app. It's quite long established and polished. Many users, good support, frequently used for creative collaboration by teams, has mobile apps. And actually has a very limited feature set - but it has all the features needed and the limitation means that it's quite approachable and easy to get into. I can certainly do what I need in it.
But ..

One nice feature is web clipping which makes the clips available as notes. Very fast and easy workflow - well, it is nice when it works/ But my experience is that it works sometimes, and other times it takes hours, and some times it doesn't work at all: the clips just disappear into a black hole - presumably they were never actually clipped to anywhere meaningful. Copy and paste is more reliable. And there are issues arising from it being a PWA program (somehow I always hit glitches with those); the 'desktop app' is in reality a browser window. And, as such, impacted by all the active extensions in the browser. I always use dark mode and have extensions that force web content into a dark mode. Unfortunately these cause glare in the document menu; that resolves if I turn the extension off, but then the side panels can glare. Seems to be a bit more amenable in Edge than Chrome. I can work around it. If I have to.

But I decided to look harder at whether there were other options. Noticed that Affine has improved. And then came across Noteey. It's local and doesn't even require signing in for the nearly fully featured free version; as with Diarium and Lattics it can be synced by using a cloud drive; I'm very comfortable with this, even if it means that taking info from the web is harder work. But no mobile version (apparently coming in the quarter before or after Christmas).

I've seen it criticised as being a clone of Heptabase, but it certainly isn't that. It doesn't have the PKM features of Heptabase, and does have a multiplicity of whiteboard features that Heptabase doesn't have. It has notes, but the notes aren't the central feature. I actually see many design similarities to Lattics.
It's developing fast, but the UI needs polish and apparently there are many little bugs being actively eradicated. It's also a very complex program; nowhere near as easy or approachable as Milanote. Tagging is weak. But the pricing is comparatively very good: before March it was $49 for a Lifetime Pro licence. That has since doubled - discounts seem frequent though - but this is still cheaper than an annual licence for Milanote. And, like Milanote, the free version is good for quite a lot of work. My first impressions are positive and it seems to tick all my required creative whiteboard boxes.

I think I'll run them both for now. and see which takes best; and which does the job I need to do now - I don't want that doing to be bogged down on a learning curve. I'll shift anything used for reference to Noteey in an attempt to extend my stay in Milanote's free tier. I don't know how many of Noteey's features I will ever use, but I'm pretty sure that the Lattics whiteboard, when it comes, will be much simpler. Maybe simpler will be enough, maybe it will be better; but using Noteey now will put me in a better position to judge.