Noto

Stone -

Happy Saturday and welcome to app review # 66 as 2022 winds down!

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A warm welcome to a single new subscriber this week YangYangSheep from Singapore. You're just one sheep but I'm glad you signed up!

This week I tested Noto which is a minimal, free, open-source, fast note-taking app without any Markdown support. The app's UI is clean and it uses a nice font although you can't change the font or font size, there's no support for adding inline images, and no unordered lists (bullets).

The "oh!" reaction I had to the app was that it implements some interesting user experiences including a nice reading mode, navigating notes in folders, and performing undo or redo actions using swipes.

A feature that is typically only found in more advanced apps is included: version history. That said the UI for it could definitely be improved. Another downside is that I crashed the app once but haven't reproduced the crash again.

Even with those two issues, I'd say Noto is worth a try and it's one I will be checking back in on.

Screenshots

Meta

Ugly

  • Click the history and it scrolled like crazy
  • Crashed it once (not sure of the steps)

Bad

  • No Markdown support
  • No bullets and if you use "-", it doesn't add "- " automatically on the next line
  • Share via email doesn't put the note title in the subject line
  • No text formatting
  • 1 font but I like it
  • 1 font size
  • No checklists
  • No image or audio attachments
  • Includes too much of the note body in the note list
  • Next and previous buttons appear active even when there are no previous and next notes

Good

  • Word counter at the top, fun at first then annoying
  • Undo and redo
  • Nice font
  • Add labels (tags) to a note
  • Filter notes by label (tags)
  • Created and last updated date and time
  • Sort notes by creation date, by last modified date, or alphabetically
  • 3 widgets: create a folder, create a note, first note
  • Archive a note
  • Folders
  • Export and import notes to JSON for backup and restore
  • Share via email
  • Share via text/SMS
  • Duplicate a note
  • Copy note text
  • Change the colour of folders
  • Settings per folder
  • Basic toolbar
  • Pin a note
  • Grid view of note list
  • Add a note to the home screen

Great

  • Set a reminder
  • 10 languages: English, Turkish, Arabic, Indonesian, Russian, Spanish, French, German, Czech, and Italian
  • Group notes by creation date, modified date, label
  • Show recent notes
  • Brightness levels independent from Android settings (optional)
  • Setting to place the cursor in the note title or body upon note creation
  • 26 folder colours and nice ones
  • Nice view of all notes with the ability to collapse and expand folders
  • Folder vault for password-protected notes

Awesome

  • Fast
  • Open Source: Apache License (Version 2.0)
  • Free
  • No ads
  • Local first
  • Reading mode
  • Reading mode across notes with previous and next buttons
  • Undo and redo via swipe left and right, very cool!
  • Version history (see Ugly)