GitJournal

Stone -

GitJournal is for more than Developers. It's a great open source app which is well designed and easy to use. It has a journal mode, linking of notes, Markdown support, inline images, fast search, and 11 languages. You can sync notes to github, Gitlab, Gitea, or self hosted which is awesome. It has some minor UI issues but the Developer provides a roadmap! This is one I will be watching very closely.

Screenshots

Meta

Ugly

  • Preview of images and tables / formatted text is not rendered in Note list, instead the fugly local image links and Markdown
  • Docs page is empty, says "This is the list template[[]]"
  • Signing up gives you a red message "Error: thanks for registering now check your email to complete the process" which left me wondering: did it work?

Bad

  • No WYSIWG editing
  • Expensive but flexible "Pay what you want" model:
  • $5.99/mo suggested but can pay from $3.09/mo up to $37.99/mo USD
  • $46.99 one time suggested or $38.99 up to $77.99 USD
  • Sluggish to display embedded images, about 3s
  • Search in note didn't work for me, it showed the # results but didn't highlight them
  • Rendering of note with text and image the text appears to flash as its being replaced by the image above it
  • Does not include images when sharing to email
  • No share as / export to PDF
  • No font choices or font size settings
  • No audio recording
  • No starring / favorite a note
  • No backup and restore although if you use git that's your backup/restore
  • When linking notes, doesn't suggest notes as you type the name
  • Attachments folder doesn't show image files
  • Can't rename image files or move them (see previous bullet)

Good

  • Once you've paid up to $38.99 you have a lifetime license
  • Dark mode
  • Bullets
  • Numbered lists
  • Toolbar (experimental)
  • Text formatting: bold, italics, code, code block
  • No highlighting
  • Inline images
  • To do lists separate or inline checkbox
  • Sort notes by date created, modified, or title
  • Grid and card view of the notes list
  • Tags (paid option)
  • Tag list (paid option)
  • Customizable home screen (paid option)
  • Configurable toolbar (paid option)
  • Search across and in notes (but doesn't highlight the text found when searching in a note)
  • Folders
  • Sub-folders (experimental)
  • Lots of options for image settings but I didn't understand many of them
  • Swipe to delete a note, with confirmation
  • Can set the default note format to Markdown, text, or "Org Mode" (not sure what that is)

Great

  • Fast search across notes and filters the notes list as you type
  • Markdown support
  • Journal editor
  • Raw editor as an option
  • Nice UI
  • One button change from dark/light mode (nice suprise)
  • Rotate image with two fingers
  • 11 Languages supported: German, Spanish, English, French, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese (and I export more will come since it's open-source)
  • Sync to github, Gitlab, Gitea, or self hosted
  • Use Github app to view the notes too, works really well even inline images!
  • Can specify a folder for attachments

Awesome

  • Open-Source
  • Link notes with Wikilink style
  • Journal view for notes list
  • Backlinks
  • Graph view (coming)
  • New note filename options: Title or one of 7 date formats
  • YAML front-matter with dates and time a note was created and modified