Open file export/import

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alinares
Posts: 3
Joined: Sun Jul 04, 2021 8:13 pm

Open file export/import

Post by alinares »

Hi! I've been evaluating the application and so far, I've fallen in love with it. I still can't understand why it is not more popular (maybe because of the price). FWIW, I discovered it in reddit (/r/PKMS).

I'm considering migrating tons of notes I have in plain text files or other systems (Evernote and Standard Notes), but with a little scripting I might be able to export all into files and folders. However, here is where I found the major blocker: The application doesn't have a good way to import from and export to open file formats–i.e. plain text.

What I'm looking for is a way to import and export notes with custom attributes using plain text. These are the options I think would be ideal:

- Markdown: It could share most of the logic using the Files and Folders importer/exporter, even if during the import process the notes are converted to HTML (and the reverse in the export process). Using front matter in the files could be a good way to keep the attributes, like this:

Code: Select all

---
comment: This is a comment
Last_Updated: 2021-01-01
title: The title attribtue
---
 
# A _heading one_, part of the note contents
 
more note contents...

- OPML: Currently, the contents of the note are discarded, and only the title is kept! I know this is because the text attribute contains the title, but if we can abuse of the attributes we can add several ones for the text (encoded in base64 maybe?) and custom attributes. The OPML could even export a full notebook using the attribute type=section.

These options would guarantee that the full content of a tree of notes could be imported and exported with minor losses (like revisions, reminders, stateys, etc), and most importantly, by using plain text.

Plain text is important because it allows leveraging other tools (for example, import every week a generated text file from emails or other sources). Also, it doesn't force me to keep using the editor if the development is abandoned.

I know there is a SDK to create plugins that could handle this, but it is not very user friendly. I have very little experience with C++, much less with Delphi. QOwnNotes, written in C++, supports JavaScript plugins by exposing some C++ events and methods, but that might be another suggestion :)

Can we expect something on these lines being implemented?

Thanks a lot!
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