Introducing notes in Micro.blog manton.org
@manton This sounds great Manton! Thank you. This would have been very handy for me last year when I relied on obscurity to 'privately' share info with a group of others. Looking forward to trying it out. 😁
@Miraz Yes, you should get a "Notes" item in the sidebar, down near the bottom (or in the profile menu for smaller windows). The web version is really the definitive version, but the native apps are nice too.
@manton That is a huge feature, and it is nice to see end-to-end encryption on private notes. Congrats!
@manton Ahhh, the other problem for me is that not only do I have my Safari window not set to fullscreen but I also have it set to 125% page zoom, otherwise the font is way to small for me to read comfortably. That meant the pop-up menu doesn't show me everything on the list and Notes was too far down. 😀
@manton Looks interesting. How is this different from drafts, though? Other than the potential to share privately with other people, which I can see as being useful for many people.
@MitchW That's one of the differences, but the other major part is as a way to write down things that will never go to your blog. In that sense, it's closer to Apple Notes or a note-taking app like Bear.
@manton Thank you for this. I have to think about how I might use it. Is it possible to create a note in the iPhone app?
@manton @MitchW Yep, this is a note-taking tool. As such I would expect greater functionality, over time, for taking notes in a way that I would not expect from saving a draft. In fact, I would never ever want to see "Drafts" as a section in the MB apps; that feature is a subset of Posts only.
From a users perspective, I believe this extends MB into a greater writing platform; this is the type of thing that competes with Ulysses, Scrivener, etc.
@manton totally recognize that this is a 1.0 and more features are coming, but any thought to utilizing Apple’s new Journaling Suggestions API (or a similar method for pulling in external information) ? I love the concept here, but I (sometimes) find it difficult to start journaling from a blank page
@manton Really nice. Instant Home screen add (though not entirely sure how I'll use it yet). Congrats on the launch!
@manton Very interesting! Is there an API for this? I’ve been playing around with web technologies recently and one of my favorite things about Micro.blog is how open everything is for tinkering.
@jeffreyflorek Yes, I'll post the notes API later today. There is room for improvement and I think we'll add to it to achieve better sync between apps in the future. It also requires the user sharing their "secret key" with any app, so there are privacy questions that apps (and users) will need to think about.
@numericcitizen I like the idea of having easily shareable and private webpages. Also, it’s a place to write things down when I’m on a Windows computer that will sync with my Apple devices, which is nice.
@manton On my iPhone 13 Mini it is not possible to access the Notes tab in Safari. I see the tab, go to press it but because it is so low down Safari’s bottom bar appears (I have the single tab option selected for Safari). As the Micro.blog side bar does not scroll, I cannot access the Notes tab.
@crossingthethreshold Oh no, I haven't tested on a small screen in a while. We'll get that fixed, thanks.
@manton I'll try it out and see how it works and fits my workflow. I'm using Ulysses now for rough drafts of posts and links I might want to share.
Congratulations on getting this out—I know you worked hard on it!
@manton congratulations on the launch! This is very exiting and I'm already moving my notes to the new service.
Some feedbacks:
- I use multiple devices and the feature didn't work properly until I sign out and sign in again in other browser sessions. It was trying to generate a new private key.
- One of my devices I use is my computer device, which uses a different iCloud account. In this device, the Micro.blog app for macOS crashes when I try to access the Notes. It crashes in the dispatch queue
com.apple.cloudkit.accountInfoFetchQueue, probably because of the different Apple ID.
Other than that, I'll perfect! As I mentioned, I'm moving my notes to the service so that I can have access to them from different devices. Also, the new iOS app is super fast, which makes it perfect to add new notes or edit existing ones. Love it!
@otaviocc Sorry about the crash! It tries to get and save the key from iCloud, so something definitely got confused with that. We need more gracefully handling of that. (There's also a preference to turn off iCloud which may help.)
@manton no worries! Awesome! I turned off the iCloud option in my work computer and added the key manually. All working perfectly! Thank you!!!
@manton I’m not clear if Notes can be used exported? I see that they can be shared, but for example, can a notebook be used exported out of Micro.blog?
@Annie I'm trying to wrap my head around it—the why part I mean. I think it's neat even if it's not for me, just curious what it sparks for you?
@iChris I'm a big fan of using fewer tools/fewer apps. Less to learn/manage/have my data stored in. I use both Obsidian and Workflowy daily but neither one is good for quick little private notes (on mobile esp.) -- at least, not for me. So i've been reluctantly using Apple Notes to fill that gap. I love the idea of having all my quick-capture notes flowing into mb instead. I also frequently have things I want to capture and maybe post later, but not yet. Those usually end up in a MB draft post which is okay but doesn't feel quite right. So I like the idea of having those little bits just go into the notes section too. Before I would kind of wrestle with: "Is this a draft post? or just a note?" Now they'll just all be notes. Less friction.
@manton oh that’s a great new feature!
I think you’ve just given the @HemisphericViews crew a topic for the next podcast as @canion explores adding the latest new thing into his workflow.
@Annie Ahhh that's a great workflow for it.
Also: Obsidian? 🤔 I edit videos for a client who does tutorials on it and I'm very curious too. But now I'm adding even more apps instead of less! 😆
@manton API unlocks so many options 🤯. Amount of times I share a note from my Notion and wish I could add more of “me” to the look, tone, and feel. Thank you for all your work!
@manton While I appreciate the hidden nature of the Notes feature, it can't replace private notes. True private notes should be accessible independant of the status of the Internet or a webservice, and probably never leave the sanctity of one's device, other than for backup, and in that case use pre-Internet encryption (encrypt data before it is sent over the wire). So, encrypted notes is probably a better term than private notes.
@renevanbelzen Interesting. To be clear, Micro.blog notes are encrypted before sent over the wire. I do want to have better offline access in the future, though.
@agilelisa We need to improve the first-launch experience, because it can be confusing. You need to start by setting up notes on the web. Then, click on Notes → "..." → Settings → Show Secret Key. You can use the iOS camera app to scan the QR code and that will give you a link that automatically sets up Strata.
@manton This is a great new feature. I was looking for something like this when I wanted to share more info with the Micro.blog Analog Tools meetup group. Nice work!
@meandering @manton Thanks for the suggestion. We talk about Strata and micro.blog Notes on Episode 105
