MyInfo Community Forums

It would be very helpful to be able to open the note body in an external application (not just attachments) and have it save back the contents. This is common in other editors, and would allow us to leverage full-featured text/markdown/html editors in conjunction with MyInfo .

Out of interest, as user

A) Could list the function MyInfo is lacking and full-featured text/ html editors have? Or at least a pointer. Yes, Markdown support, but is there something more missing? Using an external app for modify a (possibly) sub-set html standard isn't ideal, I think.
B) This is common in other editors. Do you have an example? I'm aware of this being a standard or i'm I lacking behind . Who knows.

Hi,

These are perfectly reasonable questions. I'll do my best to explain the rationale.

I'll start with the short answer, the TLDR:
- Key Bindings, External Plugins, Customized Formatting, and Software Sympatico

Next the full, primary use case (one of many):
- Have a technical project that needs to be documented
- Have a combination of very technical and very non-technical users contributing
- Have a directory of plain text files which can be integrated, merged and synced with an external git repository
- When the text files get updated (via external edit or git merge), then update the MyInfo DB
- When the MyInfo files are edited, then write back to text files
- *Allow an external editor for the technical users (like myself) to edit those external files seamlessly (as linked attachments)
- Also allow an external editor for inked notes and/or PDF, SVG or Graphviz, etc. (already exists)
- Just associate the applicable editor by the filetype
- Use MyInfo for *outlining*, *linking*, fast fuzzy *search*, metadata, tagging/filtering, multi-panes, plugins, etc.
- Use MyInfo for Universal Links between code/external documents and to/between MyInfo Documentation Pages
- Let MyInfo be the fast, readable, linkable, searchable brain, allow other apps to seamlessly share/edit content
- Be super-fast on the desktop with great GUI features and not a limited, electron-based experience

And now the longer story (if you're interested, and for general audience benefit):
Many people, particularly programmers, and including myself, have specialty editors they are accustomed to; such as *Vim*, VSCode, SublimeText, Notepad++, etc. Their brains are hard-wired to them and they have text snippets and functions and plugins that can't really be matched outside of them, nor do they need to be. And when other editors don't work with their ingrained muscle memory it can lead to frustration and swearing That said they are *designed* to coexist with other applications, not to compete with them, and they should work together. In addition to this you have a variety of Markdown editors like Typora and Markdown Monster (for Windows), but there are dozens if not hundreds of others for other platforms which can coexist peacefully as well (optionally of course). I'd throw Emacs into here too, but I don't think this app is for them, they already have org-mode!

I realize this isn't very important to most people, but for the people whom it *is* important to,
it's very important, and why try to rebuild/reinvent all the infrastructure when it's only a hotkey away
The sync could also be used for something like DokuWiki integration or other note-taking/desktop search tools.

If you have some spare time during this quarantine, check out https://vim-adventures.com/ or http://www.vimgenius.com/lessons/vim-intro for an interesting and fun diversion into this, but I should warn people that it's addictive and habit forming

Once you're dealing with this plain text then, these other editors can slice and dice it a million ways, and syntax-highlight and auto-format tables and grammar check and column edit with multiple cursors (which is a complete game changer by the way, that's probably #1 on my list) and it's generally way, way more fun and efficient.

Some other great editors that also do this well as examples (off the top of my head) are:
- QOwnNotes: (https://docs.qownnotes.org/en/latest/ge ... ain-window)
- MyBase: (http://www.wjjsoft.com/mybase_v7_docs.h ... externally)
- InfoQube: https://infoqubeim.com/drupal5/?q=node/3781
- and many others, I could go on about this all day ...

I'm very excited about MyInfo7 though,
I believe that it's very well positioned to be really incredible.


Kevin

Grumble, typed a whole message and the session timed out before submit. And didn't have copy on the clipboard.

Thanks for extensive answer. It's quite inspiring to read! Especially the part about coexist with other applications. I think it's bit a general view under developers. Don't waste development time to re-implement specialized features from other apps but co-exist.

As (end-user &) developer to developer. Do you have some suggestions to get even better positioned. Which features are lacking or could be improved to make MyInfo even functional in your case/ other company cases. A wicked API to.. some type of Metadata, some kind tagging/filtering system, multi-panes, plugins, etc. Integration with application Y. Or do you see some potential workflow not already on the radar? Or do you see some combination with other apps.
Something else, would you consider to use MyInfo the manage code snippets for example; and how would like it to be..

[For the record; note associated with the developer]. I'm only a user who wants MyInfo to succeed with a user base who is willing to spend some money for a feature rich application which fits their needs. Some insight might be interesting for setting long time goals
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About import/export. To get it straight. You have directory of plain text files (with or without markdown). These are synced with an external git repository. MyInfo should import these changed plain text files (automatically) on change. A the same there is a group of MyInfo users who search/ look-up/edit the documentation (even simultaneous). The plain text file should be updated after a change (automatically).

The database also contains external linked PDF, SVG or Graphviz. Which are edited externally. All those documents go into one section? Or multiple sections based on subfolders?

---
I'm already seeing limitation/problem, except for the import/export part. Externally linked PDF's aren't indexed, because MyInfo is unaware of changes in those files.

I appreciate the kind words, thank you.

I almost lost my post yesterday too, the forum kept logging me out, so I'm using an external editor now and pasting it in, much like I want to do in MyInfo! I'm using Typora in this case, which is positively wonderful for writing. It would be the world's worst code editor, but I've purchased both of those - and MyInfo as well!. Just saying that there's plenty of room for everybody.

There's a great book called 'Crossing the Chasm'

https://www.ignitionframework.com/cross ... invention/

which talks about how there are different users who need to be engaged and satisfied in different ways. So the initial needs aren't the same as the longer term ones. Ideas are cheap and the execution is hard, so it's not so simple and it takes a lot of refinement (and luck).

Why I'm raising this is that first the innovators need to adopt it, then it needs to build a community and gain a wider audience and onto wider acceptance.

I've spent an obsessive amount of time searching for the apps that suit what I'm really looking for and it simply doesn't exist yet so there's definitely room. I just spent a few thousand buying another app like this for a 10 person team, but I don't like it quite as much as this one. This happens for almost every project I work on. MyInfo still has a ways to go, so I'm not willing to share it with a team just yet, but it's the closest that I've seen to what I'm really looking for, and I'm very excited about the possibilities.

So first I think it needs to provide efficiency/productivity for the power users, then stabilize and then be simple and stable enough for the people with less inclination and patience to use it as well. In the beginning people want features, but later they want something that *just works* which is unfortunately a little backwards. That said this is just my opinion - but I know that people like myself who are always trying new things are the scouts for new software, then when they find something they like have a tough job convincing others to use it as well and so we need to lower those barriers and demonstrate value.

I'm very happy to elaborate about my use cases but it'll have to be another night unfortunately.

For this particular ticket, I simply want to use MyInfo to store and classify and link the notes/content, but when I want to really _write_ something and not do basic editing, then I want to use a hotkey to use an external app, like Typora, to do the actual editing, then to save it back to MyInfo for presentation and storage.

This works for me, and also helps those picky users who want to use something else, and this way you can tell them they still can

Thanks for your interest.

Kevin

p.s. if it's not plain text, then I'm not concerned about indexing it, other keywords stored in the db would be enough really just the titles and attributes (i.e. yaml front-matter) are most important anyway.