Obsidian - Connected Notes Software

I’ve used this app desktop since December and the mobile app for a couple of months. The longer I use it, the less and less I open other apps. Creating a new note is fast and editing your standard Markdown is fast and easy, enough that I never use the Markdown shortcuts bar. I use this app for three types of notes. First, I use it for daily notes, much like a digital bullet journal. Second, for project notes and references, and finally for my personal second brain/zettelkasten, and I work on all three types of notes in the same vault without any confusion. Couple of caveats: 1. WYSIWYG not available yet, so you write in Markdown. You can flip from edit to preview mode to see “pretty” text, but I just look at Markdown all day. I’m ok with that, but it might drive you nuts. 2. App and desktop/mobile synch are free, but I pay a monthly fee for this app’s synch rather than muss about with settings to manage synch myself. Plus it’s encrypted end-to-end. 3. Finally, I think it would be easier if you *started* on desktop and then *also* worked on your phone. I think desktop makes it easier to really get into and figure out the workflow and organization system that works for you. Whatever you choose, I definitely recommend you commit and use this app for a couple of weeks to really try it out. It’s so flexible, you need some time kick all the tires and see which ones you like.

The reason I'm writing this is because the this app mobile app has finally been released, much to my glee. 'Glee', that's a word that I hate to describe myself with because it has an almost humiliatingly over-emotional charge to it, but it's fitting enough in this case. The app is excellent. It's excellent for many reasons that set it apart from any other note taking app: - Hyper-customizable shortcuts to do almost anything you could want to do in the app as quickly as possible. With keyboard support. - The same, wonderful network visualization of your entire notebook, complete with tweakable physics. - Custom styles that can be written in pure CSS or selected from the set of community themes - Notes are saved to your phone's files as raw .markdown files which you can do anything you want with later. - You can sync your notes with this app's own "Sync" service, or you can even use Git. iCloud is also an option. - Third party plugins (you can even write your own!) which allow complete changes to app functionality. These features combined are, to me, absolutely staggering to see in an iPhone app. The developers of this app, in porting their desktop application to mobile, have simultaneously created what I think is one of the most powerful tools I've ever had on my phone.

Remember the days… like 30 years ago… when you discovered a new app … like a spreadsheet or a word processor … and you realized pretty quickly that you'd never go back? Well, this app is that level of a game changer. Having a Second Brain is the Killer App of the next decade, and this app is by far the best attempt at it. Sure, Markdown is a bit annoying but all of the other features far overwhelm. And the data is open and future proof. And having a "what you see is what you get" feature is on the developers roadmap, so that complaint will soon be allayed. Truly, take the jump - if you embrace it, you'll never want to leave. And your phone will be an this app phone, on which you occasionally perform other "less useful" apps… - Z2K