[xanth]

This looks like it has great potential, but what I really want is an open source "notion" with a well considered plugin & schema model. I desperately want to sync back all my data into a single cohesive graph; notes, reading list, messages, exercise activity in a more compute friendly format than MD files.

[pscanf]

Adding my own to the list: https://github.com/superegodev/superego (Warning: still an alpha.)

Distinctive points:

- It exposes the "database metaphor": your data is organized in collections of documents, each collection having a well-defined schema.

- It's all local in an app (no server component to self-host).

- It has an AI assistant on top that you can use to explore / create / update.

- It allows you to create small personal apps (e.g., a custom dashboard).

- It allows you to sync data from external sources (Strava, Google Calendar, Google Contacts.)

Cons:

- The database metaphor is quite "technical". A "normal" user is not comfortable with the idea of creating their own collections, defining a schema, etc. In fact, right now I only have developers and techies as a target audience.

- It's not optimized for any one use case. So, for example, as a notes-keeper Notion is obviously much better.

- It's still in early stages (I'm working on it alone), so:

  - There's no mobile app yet.

  - It doesn't yet support syncing between devices.

  - There are just 3 connectors to sync from external sources.

[square_usual]

There's a ton of these right now. I did some research the other day and found at least five "open source" (to various degrees, all of these are not strictly speaking open source but open core) notion alternatives, and they're all in some ways better, in some ways worse than notion. I settled on AFFiNE [0] because it felt the snappiest, but they've got a lot of telemetry and tracking so I forked to remove that and use my telemetry-removed frontend as a PWA.

[0]: https://github.com/toeverything/AFFiNE

[xanth]

I've looked into AFFiNE, it doesn't have the native data ingress I'd like.

[square_usual]

It's got a GraphQL API that seems pretty functional for all the programmatic use cases I had, fwiw.

[fourseventy]

You should look at https://github.com/TriliumNext/Trilium. It's what I use every day for the things that you mentioned.

[Fervicus]

Thanks for sharing. Are you using it on mobile? How is the experience?

[fourseventy]

I use it on mobile via the web browser, it's pretty good actually. They don't have an official mobile app yet but there might be an unofficial one, I forget exactly.

[neodymiumphish]

It's definitely a work in progress, but AnyType has a lot of functionality similar to Notion. I haven't used it in a while, so I don't know whether there are plugins in any meaningful capacity.

From past experience, it's even pretty simple to host your own sync server to get away from their account/storage limits.

[notachatbot123]

AnyType is not open-source.

[neodymiumphish]

Fair enough, it's protocol is open source and the apps are source available. Modifications can be made by individuals for their own uses, though. I think it's as close as you can expect to get with a mostly full-fledged Notion competitor.

In any case, I don't particularly enjoy AnyType, despite coming back to it a few times to test it out (and still maintaining my own sync server, despite not actively using it, in case I go back to try it out again after some demonstrably updates). Just pointing out that it's a less restrictive alternative.

[wim]

We're building a new multiplayer IDE but for docs/tasks [1]. Local-first, real-time collaborative and end-to-end-encrypted sync. Not open source but self-hostable with a single binary and hackable with plugins (custom properties, views, code, etc).

[1] https://thymer.com

[abstractbeliefs]

No open source, then I'm not playing.

I use Zim wiki for everything just now and I don't like it. I'm in the market for a replacement, and would even pay like with how Immich does it.

Unless the source code is available or you put it into legal escrow for when you go bust/abandon the software†, I will not invest my time and data into a system where I am entirely dependent on another organisation or service.

† And you will go bust or abandon the software before I die!

[niklashog]

If you need total control they offer selfhosting.

[cweagans]

That is not at all the same thing.

[ObengObeng]

I will definitely be checking this out when it comes out! Hopefully soon!

[ednico]

Seems amazing - I cannot wait to test Thymer out!

[bakli]

Like Obsidian?

[Kye]

I was surprised at how similar Trilium looks to Obsidian when it was suggested in a thread somewhere: https://triliumnotes.org/

It's open source and as far as I can tell uses a database.

[shmoogy]

Obsidian isn't open source

[echelon]

I'm still happy to use it. It's not like they can rug pull on the data or even the existing app binaries.

I'd really like to see the team get rewarded for their work, too. I'd be sad if it went 100% open and they didn't so much as draw a market salary from it.

I think if it went open, they'd get nothing. That's the one thing I strongly dislike about open source is that only hyperscalers really economically benefit from it.

They've done a remarkable service for all of us.

[alabhyajindal]

I used to be very against closed source products but changed my mind recently. One of the founders of Obsidian makes some great points here: https://forum.obsidian.md/t/open-sourcing-of-obsidian/1515/1...

[echelon]

This is a great rebuttal.

99.9% of the internet is closed source and we don't ask for it to be opened. From our ISPs, to Google, to the hyperscalers.

If anything, I think we should be asking those things to be open. If we're only asking the little guys, the big guys with trillion dollar market caps skate by. This is exactly how they want it. Fewer gradients for small players to grow.

[hexo]

I do ask for that and generally refuse to use closed source sw. But... something being opensource doesnt always mean you can change stuff. Like signal-desktop that has build process so badly convoluted that even gentoo doesnt build it itself. (has it improved already?)

[j1elo]

> From what I see of the pricing options in your business model, having your code released under a FOSS licence would make no difference to how you make money.

Except that making their client FOSS would help a lot to replicate the APIs and create a FOSS server, which would definitely make a difference on how they make money.

[stronglikedan]

> The cost to benefit ratio is very low for our small team of 2, and our plate is already full.

Wow, I didn't know the team was so small - go them!

[wsve]

It was that small in 2020, it's more in the 5-10 range these days

[braza]

> It's not like they can rug pull on the data or even the existing app binaries.

This.

I spend 6 months to export 100K notes from Evernote mostly because they intentionally throttle the exports to a limit and you can extract it only in their proprietary format that truncates some data.

[Jaxan]

I specifically like md, because I will always be able to open it and modify, even if the original app no longer exists. I use obsidian without any extensions.

I must admit that I don’t archive things like exercise activity. So maybe the simple mindset won’t work then.

[kgarten]

Logseq? (Though it uses md)

[scoring-wade-6c]

You can try https://getoutline.com

[fallen_comrade]

Can vouch, outline is great

[elbear]

Tiddlywiki

[gman83]

AppFlowy ?

[blubber]

Isn't really (ie fully) open source, is it?

[albertdessaint]

You might be interested in Graphiti: https://github.com/getzep/graphiti. With a self-hosted Graphiti MCP, you can connect ChatGPT or Claude to build a knowledge graph from all your data. You can then query and update the graph directly through conversation & by ingesting data and visualize the graph using tools like the Neo4j Explorer.Don’t know if that could fit your use case but that could be a fun way!