Hey all, I’m a Linux baby and just discovered all my Onenote notes for DnD aren’t transferable to my new machine 🙃

I’ve seen a few alternatives, specifically Joplin, mentioned, but what I’m looking for is an editor that lets me move notes all around or type in random places like Onenote. I found Spiral, but it’s not my favorite, though it does have what I need so far, if at a very bare and basic level.

Can anyone recommend anything with the ‘type anywhere’ functionality? I’m not even wholly invested in it being FOSS, but this seemed like the best place to ask. Thanks y’all

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4 points

It doesn’t look like any of those have the basic feature of placing things where you want inside a page like onenote does.

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18 points

My big takeaway from this thread is that, wow, people actually use that feature. I use OneNote at work, and I absolutely loathe that if I click a bit too low, I end up outside my note.

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4 points

It’s basically the main feature of onenote that I use, being able to make technical notes and tables about circuits or cabling that I’m designing and drag them around to arrange it all is really nice.

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1 point

Ah, I see. I think. I’m mostly troubleshooting through logs, packet captures, configurations, etc.

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3 points

Yeah, that’s my #1 reason to not use it. I’ve got a long list of reasons to dislike OneNote, but that’s the big one.

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1 point

Unfortunately I deal with sensitive data in my notes, so I’m restricted. Can’t even sync my notebook off my local SSD.

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6 points

Logseq has a “whiteboard” feature which is the closest I’ve seen.

OneNote has been the only tool Ive failed to find a close alternative to, which is a shame because I hate the new simplified versions of OneNote.

I will say though, the linking available on Obsidian and Logseq is fantastic for d&d notes and worth ditching OneNote anyway (for me it was at least).

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4 points

I haven’t used One Note but Obsidian lets you make canvases which you can freely place things on, kind of like a cork board.

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3 points

Obsidian does… sorta. They call it “canvas”. But I think it’s more for visually connecting notes to other notes, not to connect different things within a given note.

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2 points

You can use the excalidraw plugin maybe? I guess I’m not understanding the placement work flow you’re speaking of. All the options I listed are free so you can download and try them. Big feature of Obsidian is the plugin marketplace. But hey, if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work.

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3 points

Basically in onenote you can drag any box of text, table, image, excel table, pdf embed, and so on and place it anywhere you want on the page. It’s really nice for making notes because you can make a quick note in a box and just drag it around to arrange things.

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1 point

Ah, ok. Thanks for the explanation. I was wildly off in my visualization of how you were using it. The other poster in this thread is right, the Canvas function can do a lot of that. You’d have to try it to see if it actually fits your use case. Regarding the others mentioned, I’m not sure any of them can do it. But Obsidian canvas or you could also play with the Excalidraw plugin. Or just test it separately here and imagine that functionality within your notes app, that’s what the plug in does.

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2 points

I’m not sure what OneNote’s feature does, but in Logseq you can make a whiteboard and embed other pages and text boxes.

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