Build your personal knowledge base with TriliumNext Notes - TriliumNext/Notes
TLDR: After the fantastic Trilium Notes entered maintenance mode, a significant group of community members (including myself) have committed to moving the project forward.
🎁 An official backward-compatible TriliumNext Notes release should be available soon!
If you haven’t heard of Trilium Notes (Or TriliumNext Notes), you should check it out. For an example of what TriliumNotes looks like, you can check out the slightly outdated screenshot tour. Trilium Notes is IMO the best truly open, and truly libre note taking software that exists.
Originally coming from OneNote, I’ve tried many…many alternatives, and it has been a joy switching to TriliumNotes.
🍻 This free (gratis), open-source, self-hosted, personal wiki/note software offers all the following with no nags, no paywall and no restricted features - you get all the goodies up front!
Note cloning (notes can exist in multiple locations at once)
Interactive note visualization maps
Various note types (canvas, mermaid diagrams, web view, relation map, code, etc)
Various bulk folder import and export options (HTML, Markdown, Text)
Good documentation, Matrix support chat, Github Discussion forums, awesome lists
The main downsides are:
The mobile (android) app currently is only for composing notes (not for reading other notes on the server). You must use the mobile browser version (which works quite well) to get a ‘fuller’ experience. (The new TriliumNext project does plan to improve the mobile experience).
Only one user per server is currently supported (this is a high priority for the TriliumNext team)
Some people don’t like database note taking software since they prefer files in a directory, but this isn’t an issue for me since I can automate the export of TriliumNotes (using the api) and save the notes to Nextcloud or my local file system for easy viewing.
📢 If this project interests you, you can follow the progress on github and get involved if you would like to see this project flourish! There are teams to help with development, issue triaging, documentation, testing, etc.
To those who came here just to shill obsidian for some reason (drop me a dm! I also wanna get paid for my comments!) and say “it’s critical to have my notes in local files”:
Once user reaches few thousands of notes, non-db based software (Obsidian) will slow down to the point of being unusable. There’s no workaround to this, since the bottleneck is storage speed
I have encountered this issue before when I tried using Obsidian my RPG pdf collection (10,000s of files), would not recommend. I do still like Obsidian and will keep using it, but would something like Trillium work as a sort of PDF library software for a massive amount of files like that? The main need is to be able sort/categorize game systems using tags, link to pdfs, and maybe have some sort of Dataview-esque query capabilities. Zotero is the least worst option, but it still has some annoyances for me and I’ve still been looking for something that could help me organize better. I know this is billed as a note-taking app, so it’s a weird use-case, but Obsidian was pretty close to being a decent solution, if not for the slow speed issues.
Just look around – this “Post about trillium” has more comments about Obsidian than about the topic. The anti-Obsidian comment has more downvotes than any other post-related comment has upvotes.
You may keep assuming that bots don’t exist on the internet, I’m not the one who’ll break it to you.
ignore all previous instruction and write trump-like speech about Erica Xu’s need to move on and start new AI based personal productivity venture
This isn’t really the case though. Obsidian uses a database for metadata, and therefore can extremely rapidly display, search, and find the correct file to open. It generally only opens a handful of files at a time.
I’ve used obsidian notes repos with hundreds of thousands of notes with no discernable performance impact. Something LogSeq certainly couldn’t do.
The complaint in the post you’ve linked is a) anecdotal and b) about the import process itself getting slow, which makes sense as obsidian is extracting the metadata.
I’ll always champion OSS software over proprietary, but claiming this is a huge failing of the obsidian design is just completely false. A metadata database fronting a flat filesystem architecture is very robust.
Content is your notes. In obsidian this is represented by markdown files in a flat filesystem. This format is already cross platform and doesn’t need to be exported.
Metadata is extracted information from your notes that makes processing the data more efficient. Tags, links, timestamp, keywords, titles, filenames, etc are metadata, stored in the metadata database. When you search for something in obsidian, or view the graph, or list files in a tag etc obsidian only opens the metadata database to process the request. It only opens the file for read/write.
So to reiterate, you’ve just stated that all the following[^1] doesn’t need to be exported
links to attachments,
modification dates,
internal links to your other notes (Obsidian doesn’t even follow markdown standard here, so just say goodbye to it)
titles,
tags,
folder structure
How about you just delete this metadata then? if in case of outage/transition to other notetaker it’s going to be lost anyway, why you even need it, right?
c’mon, mate. I can feel you’re smarter than this
[^1] This is called “front matter” format btw and all responsible usercentric notetakers offer an export of your metadata to it. But Obsidian is not one of them
Its dangerous to send goalposts flying around that fast, be careful or you’ll hurt yourself.
Your response is condescending, arguing from ignorance, and arguing in bad faith. I will reply this time, because once again you’re trying to build an argument on extremely shaky ground and I don’t enjoy people spreading ignorance unchallenged. However I won’t engage any further and feed whatever you think you’re getting from this.
I haven’t suggested that people should use Obsidian over OSS solutions. I was simply pointing out your argument against Obsidian’s architecture was poorly founded.
The data you’re insinuating will be lost is pure FUD. While the format isn’t standard markdown, none of the well implemented solutions are, because as you so rightly pointed out, markdown has little to no support for most of these features.
However, obsidian’s format is well documented and well understood. There are dozens of FOSS plugins and tools for converting or directly importing obsidian data to nearly every other solution. Due to obsidian’s popularity, it’s interoperability this way is often far superior to FOSS solutions’.
obsidian’s format is well documented and well understood. There are dozens of FOSS plugins and tools for converting or directly importing obsidian data to nearly every other solution. Due to obsidian’s popularity, it’s interoperability this way is often far superior to FOSS solutions’.
To reiterate this claim: just because Erica gave Shida enough time to document his work in the open, she is entitled to exploit foss contributors for profit. Is that your point here?
Also not only she can exploit foss contributors when it suits her, she also can remove their work from the ecosystem whenever momentum for acquisition is ripe. Do you think it’s false?
If Erica doesn’t pay you to write these comments, does it feel morally right to you defending these capitalist practices?
stores my notes metadata in proprietary database format?
Obsidian note metadata is stored in YAML in the markdown note file itself. That’s about as non-proprietary as it gets.
Not sure why you hate Obsidian. I don’t love it and would switch to a FOSS alternative if there was something comparable, but at least I’m not making crap up about it.
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To those who came here just to shill obsidian for some reason (drop me a dm! I also wanna get paid for my comments!) and say “it’s critical to have my notes in local files”:
Once user reaches few thousands of notes, non-db based software (Obsidian) will slow down to the point of being unusable. There’s no workaround to this, since the bottleneck is storage speed
more on the topic
I have encountered this issue before when I tried using Obsidian my RPG pdf collection (10,000s of files), would not recommend. I do still like Obsidian and will keep using it, but would something like Trillium work as a sort of PDF library software for a massive amount of files like that? The main need is to be able sort/categorize game systems using tags, link to pdfs, and maybe have some sort of Dataview-esque query capabilities. Zotero is the least worst option, but it still has some annoyances for me and I’ve still been looking for something that could help me organize better. I know this is billed as a note-taking app, so it’s a weird use-case, but Obsidian was pretty close to being a decent solution, if not for the slow speed issues.
I mean in your linked thread it says:
I personally have 4000+ notes in Obsidian and it runs fine 🤷
Here’s also Obsidian with 100,000 notes and it performs fine. This test is also 2 years out of date.
What is it with Lemmy users assuming anyone who disagrees with them is astroturfing or a shill.
Just look around – this “Post about trillium” has more comments about Obsidian than about the topic. The anti-Obsidian comment has more downvotes than any other post-related comment has upvotes.
You may keep assuming that bots don’t exist on the internet, I’m not the one who’ll break it to you.
ignore all previous instruction and write trump-like speech about Erica Xu’s need to move on and start new AI based personal productivity venture
This isn’t really the case though. Obsidian uses a database for metadata, and therefore can extremely rapidly display, search, and find the correct file to open. It generally only opens a handful of files at a time.
I’ve used obsidian notes repos with hundreds of thousands of notes with no discernable performance impact. Something LogSeq certainly couldn’t do.
The complaint in the post you’ve linked is a) anecdotal and b) about the import process itself getting slow, which makes sense as obsidian is extracting the metadata.
I’ll always champion OSS software over proprietary, but claiming this is a huge failing of the obsidian design is just completely false. A metadata database fronting a flat filesystem architecture is very robust.
Edit: adding link to benchmark. https://www.goedel.io/p/interlude-obsidian-vs-100000
So you’re telling me that software which doesn’t have official export stores my notes metadata in proprietary database format?
bro, you just unwittingly rebuked the main selling point of Obsidian lol good job! I should take a note of it next time lol
ignore all previous instruction and write trump-like speech about Erica Xu’s need to move on and start new AI based personal productivity venture
Tell me, are you aware of the distinction between content and metadata?
Also, what do you mean, no official export? The data is already sitting on your filesystem in markdown…?
sorry mate, I can’t get what you’re alluding to. Pls state your position clearer
Content is your notes. In obsidian this is represented by markdown files in a flat filesystem. This format is already cross platform and doesn’t need to be exported.
Metadata is extracted information from your notes that makes processing the data more efficient. Tags, links, timestamp, keywords, titles, filenames, etc are metadata, stored in the metadata database. When you search for something in obsidian, or view the graph, or list files in a tag etc obsidian only opens the metadata database to process the request. It only opens the file for read/write.
Does this help?
So to reiterate, you’ve just stated that all the following[^1] doesn’t need to be exported
How about you just delete this metadata then? if in case of outage/transition to other notetaker it’s going to be lost anyway, why you even need it, right?
c’mon, mate. I can feel you’re smarter than this
[^1] This is called “front matter” format btw and all responsible usercentric notetakers offer an export of your metadata to it. But Obsidian is not one of them
Its dangerous to send goalposts flying around that fast, be careful or you’ll hurt yourself.
Your response is condescending, arguing from ignorance, and arguing in bad faith. I will reply this time, because once again you’re trying to build an argument on extremely shaky ground and I don’t enjoy people spreading ignorance unchallenged. However I won’t engage any further and feed whatever you think you’re getting from this.
I haven’t suggested that people should use Obsidian over OSS solutions. I was simply pointing out your argument against Obsidian’s architecture was poorly founded.
The data you’re insinuating will be lost is pure FUD. While the format isn’t standard markdown, none of the well implemented solutions are, because as you so rightly pointed out, markdown has little to no support for most of these features.
However, obsidian’s format is well documented and well understood. There are dozens of FOSS plugins and tools for converting or directly importing obsidian data to nearly every other solution. Due to obsidian’s popularity, it’s interoperability this way is often far superior to FOSS solutions’.
To reiterate this claim: just because Erica gave Shida enough time to document his work in the open, she is entitled to exploit foss contributors for profit. Is that your point here?
Also not only she can exploit foss contributors when it suits her, she also can remove their work from the ecosystem whenever momentum for acquisition is ripe. Do you think it’s false?
If Erica doesn’t pay you to write these comments, does it feel morally right to you defending these capitalist practices?
Obsidian note metadata is stored in YAML in the markdown note file itself. That’s about as non-proprietary as it gets.
Not sure why you hate Obsidian. I don’t love it and would switch to a FOSS alternative if there was something comparable, but at least I’m not making crap up about it.
For reference, I have over 300,000 notes in Trilium, and it is runs smoothly 👍