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Notes app for Android (+Warning about Samsung Notes)

pythonmegapixel
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Right so to begin, a quick warning about Samsung Notes. Your device has to be rooted to access your note files because some idiot at Samsung decided to put them in the app-specific internal storage. Inside the app you can do a select all & export to pdf but only if you have fewer than 100 notes and don't mind losing the directory structure.

I'm sure these limitations are intended to create vendor lock-in, but they also have the side-effect of making it impossible to quickly make an adequate backup if you have a large number of notes. Quite why this flaw is ignored by so many online reviews of the app is beyond me.

 

Anyway, with that in mind can anyone suggest a better Android notes app? Required features:

  • Ability to do a bulk export of all notes to PDF, JPEG, SVG or something similar. I need notes to be able to go into a proper folder structure and it would be nice if that could be preserved when exporting but not essential
  • Works locally on my device, I don't mind if cloud sync functions exist but they must not be integral to the app (i.e. not Evernote)
  • Support for the pen on my Galaxy S6 Lite tablet
  • Pages that can easily be printed (I.e. should be A4 not infinite scroll) and can have different backgrounds such as ruled and squared

One time payment OK - but no subscription services.

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pythonmegapixel

into tech, public transport and architecture // amateur programmer // youtuber // beginner photographer

Thanks for reading all this by the way!

By the way, my desktop is a docked laptop. Get over it, No seriously, I have an exterrnal monitor, keyboard, mouse, headset, ethernet and cooling fans all connected. Using it feels no different to a desktop, it works for several hours if the power goes out, and disconnecting just a few cables gives me something I can take on the go. There's enough power for all games I play and it even copes with basic (and some not-so-basic) video editing. Give it a go - you might just love it.

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Onenote? MS?

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(Abit Fatal1ty FP9 IN SLI, C2Duo E8400, 6 GB Ram DDR2 800, far too less diskspace, Gainward Phantom 560 GTX broken need fixing)

 

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1 minute ago, Anghammarad said:

Onenote? MS?

No export function from the mobile app and as far as I can tell no option to use A4 pages

 

Assuming by MS you are referring to Microsoft and not another app

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pythonmegapixel

into tech, public transport and architecture // amateur programmer // youtuber // beginner photographer

Thanks for reading all this by the way!

By the way, my desktop is a docked laptop. Get over it, No seriously, I have an exterrnal monitor, keyboard, mouse, headset, ethernet and cooling fans all connected. Using it feels no different to a desktop, it works for several hours if the power goes out, and disconnecting just a few cables gives me something I can take on the go. There's enough power for all games I play and it even copes with basic (and some not-so-basic) video editing. Give it a go - you might just love it.

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1 hour ago, pythonmegapixel said:

I'm sure these limitations are intended to create vendor lock-in, but they also have the side-effect of making it impossible to quickly make an adequate backup if you have a large number of notes. Quite why this flaw is ignored by so many online reviews of the app is beyond me

Of course, you're supposed to sync with Samsung Cloud and that's your "backup"...

As to reviews not mentioning it, it's because it's unfortunately become the "standard and expected" way of working for mobile apps 😞 

People aren't trained to worry about data portability, they're trained to use the built-in cloud services in the hope that they'll eventually run out of space and can be told "just pay $5 a month to upgrade", and if their devices fails/gets old "just buy from us again and it'll all be back like magic!"

 

wish I could /s...

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36 minutes ago, pythonmegapixel said:

Assuming by MS you are referring to Microsoft and not another app

yep exactly, the Microsoft OneNote... 

 

Ah ok... I used One Note on the mobile for making notes and with office lens, then work on those on the computer app.

Main System:

Anghammarad : Asrock Taichi x570, AMD Ryzen 7 5800X @4900 MHz. 32 GB DDR4 3600, some NVME SSDs, Gainward Phoenix RTX 3070TI

 

System 2 "Igluna" AsRock Fatal1ty Z77 Pro, Core I5 3570k @4300, 16 GB Ram DDR3 2133, some SSD, and a 2 TB HDD each, Gainward Phantom 760GTX.

System 3 "Inskah" AsRock Fatal1ty Z77 Pro, Core I5 3570k @4300, 16 GB Ram DDR3 2133, some SSD, and a 2 TB HDD each, Gainward Phantom 760GTX.

 

On the Road: Acer Aspire 5 Model A515-51G-54FD, Intel Core i5 7200U, 8 GB DDR4 Ram, 120 GB SSD, 1 TB SSD, Intel CPU GFX and Nvidia MX 150, Full HD IPS display

 

Media System "Vio": Aorus Elite AX V2, Ryzen 7 5700X, 64 GB Ram DDR4 3200 Mushkin, 1 275 GB Crucial MX SSD, 1 tb Crucial MX500 SSD. IBM 5015 Megaraid, 4 Seagate Ironwolf 4TB HDD in raid 5, 4 WD RED 4 tb in another Raid 5, Gainward Phoenix GTX 1060

 

(Abit Fatal1ty FP9 IN SLI, C2Duo E8400, 6 GB Ram DDR2 800, far too less diskspace, Gainward Phantom 560 GTX broken need fixing)

 

Nostalgia: Amiga 1200, Tower Build, CPU/FPU/MMU 68EC020, 68030, 68882 @50 Mhz, 10 MByte ram (2 MB Chip, 8 MB Fast), Fast SCSI II, 2 CDRoms, 2 1 GB SCSI II IBM Harddrives, 512 MB Quantum Lightning HDD, self soldered Sync changer to attach VGA displays, WLAN

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2 hours ago, pythonmegapixel said:

Right so to begin, a quick warning about Samsung Notes. Your device has to be rooted to access your note files because some idiot at Samsung decided to put them in the app-specific internal storage. Inside the app you can do a select all & export to pdf but only if you have fewer than 100 notes and don't mind losing the directory structure.

I'm sure these limitations are intended to create vendor lock-in, but they also have the side-effect of making it impossible to quickly make an adequate backup if you have a large number of notes. Quite why this flaw is ignored by so many online reviews of the app is beyond me.

 

Anyway, with that in mind can anyone suggest a better Android notes app? Required features:

  • Ability to do a bulk export of all notes to PDF, JPEG, SVG or something similar. I need notes to be able to go into a proper folder structure and it would be nice if that could be preserved when exporting but not essential
  • Works locally on my device, I don't mind if cloud sync functions exist but they must not be integral to the app (i.e. not Evernote)
  • Support for the pen on my Galaxy S6 Lite tablet
  • Pages that can easily be printed (I.e. should be A4 not infinite scroll) and can have different backgrounds such as ruled and squared

One time payment OK - but no subscription services.

Joplin might be an option to consider, though I don't know if it does stylus/digital pen input.

Judge a product on its own merits AND the company that made it.

How to setup MSI Afterburner OSD | How to make your AMD Radeon GPU more efficient with Radeon Chill | (Probably) Why LMG Merch shipping to the EU is expensive

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Mid 2023 AlTech Desktop Refresh - AMD R7 5800X (Mid 2023), XFX Radeon RX 6700XT MBA (Mid 2021), MSI X370 Gaming Pro Carbon (Early 2018), 32GB DDR4-3200 (16GB x2) (Mid 2022

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3 hours ago, AluminiumTech said:

Joplin might be an option to consider, though I don't know if it does stylus/digital pen input.

Unfortunately it doesn't.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

 

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

pythonmegapixel

into tech, public transport and architecture // amateur programmer // youtuber // beginner photographer

Thanks for reading all this by the way!

By the way, my desktop is a docked laptop. Get over it, No seriously, I have an exterrnal monitor, keyboard, mouse, headset, ethernet and cooling fans all connected. Using it feels no different to a desktop, it works for several hours if the power goes out, and disconnecting just a few cables gives me something I can take on the go. There's enough power for all games I play and it even copes with basic (and some not-so-basic) video editing. Give it a go - you might just love it.

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Nebo (https://www.nebo.app/) looks promising. Anyone have any experience with that?

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

 

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

pythonmegapixel

into tech, public transport and architecture // amateur programmer // youtuber // beginner photographer

Thanks for reading all this by the way!

By the way, my desktop is a docked laptop. Get over it, No seriously, I have an exterrnal monitor, keyboard, mouse, headset, ethernet and cooling fans all connected. Using it feels no different to a desktop, it works for several hours if the power goes out, and disconnecting just a few cables gives me something I can take on the go. There's enough power for all games I play and it even copes with basic (and some not-so-basic) video editing. Give it a go - you might just love it.

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