App dedicated to quick notes

Feature requests
1

One of my issues with Obsidian is still the “over-complex” workflow when I just want to add a quick note. Before I can add a note, this happens:

  • If it’s the first time opening the app, it takes like 6 seconds to go from the icon/splash screen to the app itself
  • Even when the app is already opened in the background, sometimes it has to “Load plugins”, “Load XYZ”, etc. More time added.
  • When I click the + button to add a note and I start typing the title, it shows me all the notes that match that title, which gets in the way. If I’m adding a new note, I don’t think it should try to add new content to a new note, unless I clicked another button just for that, not the + button. Or if I click the + button, it could show me 2 options: Add to Note, and New Note. If I pick New Note, then I don’t want to see the matches.
  • If I click Enter by mistake, when there’s a matching note, now I’m inside that note, instead of creating a new note, so I have to go back to the beginning.

This, to me, is a very convoluted workflow.

My suggestion would be that the team would provide a separate app, maybe call it QuickNote or something. This obviously syncs with the main app, but it’s really just that, an app to add a quick note. No plugins, no themes, no search, nothing.

Workflow:

  • Open the app
  • Shows an empty note page with just 2 fields: Title (optional) and Body.
  • At the bottom, a Submit button. That’s it.

Quick, light, no obstacles.

We could set the default folder for new notes, as well as a default title (in case we don’t want to add a title to the note), if we wanted to, for example “Quick Note” and it would increase the numbering after that as we create new notes and if there’s a note with that name already in that default folder.

I’ve been using Apple Notes just for this purpose (adding quick notes) and then I have to import them to Obsidian, which adds an extra (and unnecessary) step. I would love to just use Obsidian for all my notes, but the current workflow is just too painful at times.

2

If your request is for mobile, there is a request already: A Workflow to quickly capture ideas on mobile, and “Mobile quick capture” is on Obsidian’s roadmap (with no details). Some workarounds are mentioned in the request thread and in Your mobile Quick Capture solution. You can also use any app that can save a Markdown file to your vault folder.

2 Likes
3

Yes, my request is for mobile.

I checked the links you provided, and came to the conclusion that maybe those won’t work as expected, because even if I use an app like Taio for example, I still need to open Obsidian in order for it to sync with my laptop. Not a big issue, and it’s definitely better than always having to wait for Obsidian to load and all that extra workflow.

I hope the team comes up with the “Mobile quick capture” option soon. Glad to see that it’s in the roadmap! Appreciate you sharing that.

EDIT

Since I have Keyboard Maestro, I found a way to use Taio to my advantage with some extra work (but it’s only done once, which is the creation of the Keyboard Maestro macro).

In Taio, I can set it to create new notes in the iCloud Drive folder. New notes are then automatically synced to my laptop to the folder:
~/Library/Mobile Documents/iCloud~app~cyan~taio/Documents/Editor

Now, in Keyboard Maestro, I can have it run a macro periodically (maybe once a day or 2-3 times a day), where it checks the content of my vault’s root and compares those files with the files in ~/Library/Mobile Documents/iCloud~app~cyan~taio/Documents/Editor.

It moves unique files to the vault, and renames files with the same name by appending the current date, then moves them.

Just a workaround until we have the official “Mobile quick capture”.

4

I find that the solution offered by @ryanjamurphy works exactly how I would like the app to work:

Thanks Ryan🙌

1 Like