It has a significantly better UI than Calibre, no question. I only use it to manage my ebook library and send them to my various Kindle email addresses. I can’t compare any more advanced features because I didn’t use them in Calibre and I still don’t in CW.

I gave up on FOSS alternatives and journal exclusively in Obsidian. it’s not open source, but the file format is simple text files. Which for me, was a must.

Would Papra work for you? I like it better than Paperless-NGX personally, which others have mentioned. But I’ll admit I’m not sure it’ll fit in your use case as I’m feeding it newly scanned documents for mine rather than existing file/folder hierarchy.

Yep, same here. Works well.

That’s a great idea. Do you have it persist between sessions? Like one server #1 it’s always green?

Hey that’s super helpful, thank you. Definitely going to try this out.

I’m still a beginner myself, but from my experience I’d say skip Nextcloud at least to start with. I found even the AIO version confusing to set up. Hell, I still do. I have the NextcloudPi image running on a Pi4 but am actively looking for a replacement because it runs like crap on that hardware and I don’t need all of the features it offers/tries to cram into one service.

I’m leaning towards FileRun. Yeah, you have to pay for it once. But so far it seems to be the best alternative that doesn’t try to do too much. And yes, I tried Owncloud Infinite Scale, before everyone jumps on me :)

Oh nice! I’ll check it out.

Thanks for the suggestions. I’ll try them out. One thing that I hate is critical for me is integration with Android auto. It’s the last Google service I can’t seem to quit. Might have to give up and just roll with Bluetooth instead.

I want to leave too, but I really like PlexAmp for my music streaming. And no, Finamp doesn’t work nearly as well or look as nice.

I do love me some gruvbox. First thing I switch with a new install of Obsidian, or anything else that has it…

Notesnook might work for you.

Awful app

I was poking around the Raspberry imager utility and they had RISC OS, which is and old operating system that was apparently fairly popular in the UK, but I’d never heard of it in the US. I loaded it up on my Pi 1 and had fun exploring it. Not exactly useful, but cool to mess with: RISC OS

Seafile. It’s super fast and lightweight. There are some caveats though:

• Data is stored in git-like chunks on the server side. There is Seafuse and Sea drive functions that you can leverage to “assemble” the data on server side for backups. I personally use rclone mount, then backup.

• Paywall hiding some features. The community edition is free but is missing some features that pro has. Pro edition is free for 3 or less users.

• Documentation isn’t great. The forum is active so that’s helpful, but some of the docs take some time to understand

• Chinese owned. As far as I can tell, there is no call home for a self hosted server, so I don’t think it’s a worry in that case.

All that said, I like it much better than Syncthing for it’s selective sync. All files on each client are synced to the server. But unlike Syncthing, it doesn’t sync all data with each client. This is vital for me with some devices with small storage drives, so I would t want all files to sync. Yet I can still reach to the server from any client and pull data from any other client. Syncthing has an ignore flag, but that seemed way more trouble to setup than just sticking with Seafile.

Pretty big caveat to that though. Joplin names the individual text files some huge hexadecimal value, unlike Obsidian (and maybe Loseq). And it appends some meta data in the file itself.

I personally felt this was unacceptable for my use case. And if Logseq’s android app wasn’t so bad, is be using it instead of Obsidian.

Was going to say the same. Obsidian has very little proprietary stuff in it, other than maybe some plugins users may elect to use. Other than that, it’s just folders full of markdown files.

Same here. Works well.

Seafile is great…with caveats that seem to bother people away from it:

1. Files are stored as git-like chunks on the server

2. Features behind a paywall for more than 3 users (Pro vs Comminity versions)

3. Documentation can be very confusing at times

Item 1 can be mitigated by utilizing tools like Rclone to mount the files on the server, reassembling the chunks, then back up and unmount when done. Item 2 isn’t a deal breaker for me.

It is super fast and reliable in my experience. I specify wanted the selective sync because my stupid MacBook has a tiny SSD, but I still wanted access to files from other device libraries.

I’ve tried 'em all. And I am always on the lookout for new apps that can do what I want. So far, Obsidian is the best.

• Joplin: adds meta data to your text files making it nearly impossible to find anything outside of Joplin unless you export

• Logseq: the closest substitute to Obsidian. The android app is almost unusable in my testing. And it’s an outlined based note app, so it requires a different mindset

• Silverbullet: such a neat project. The PWA runs great on every device I’ve tried it on. That said, I find it hard to navigate and will require more learning to take full advantage of its features

• Nextcloud Notes: decent if you already have an instance running. Not worth it just for Notes though. It’s very spartan, feature-wise

• Quillpad: the closest Google Keep alternative I’ve found so far. Does require Nextcloud insurance to sync though. At least currently.

• Acreom: very cool project. Similar to Obsidian and Logseq. Local first…unless you’re on mobile, then you are required to have an account and use their sync.

• Notesnook: has great features but does not store the notes on plain text (due to encryption), which is a deal breaker for my use case

• Memos: very easy to selfhost. Think of it like a personal twitter feed. Stores entries in a db file, so it’s out for me

I tested others, and many didnt last long enough in my testing to even be worth writing about. I find Obsidian’s folder hierarchy easier to fit around how my brain works. And the plain text files in folders, maintaining the hierarchy, is a killer feature for me. Lots of folks self host a sync solution. And I want to but am currently paying for their basic sync plan of $5/mo.