Noter is a simple Java program for writing TODOs on different files. Simply compile the java file on your system, then call "java noter" on your terminal and write your message.
I use org-mode (an Emacs mode/ file type) quite a lot and I'm a big fan of it. I use it for work, for planning my code, and for my personal todo-list. One annoying thing, though, is that I have to visit a certain file to add to each list. I might be at a work meeting and I get something to do, or I might be taking general notes and then want to write some comments on a specific java file. With Noter, all that note-taking gets a lot snappier.
More importantly, This tool couples well with the rest of my workflow because of the by-file formatting adjustment. You can adjust Noter to your system, instead of having to adapt to Noter.
You can specify a specific file as an argument of the program, or assign one through the targetFileName variable. This way, you don't have to constantly specify a single file if you usually default to it, but you always have the option to
All messages are prefixed by a bullet which, depending on certain filetypes, will ensure the added notes are formatted correctly. For example:
- The bullet "* TODO " is added on files of type .org an Emacs notekeeping mode
- The bullet "// TODO " is added on files of type .java, to correctly mark them as comments on java files.
And so on. You can also specify your own bullet that would get used on any filetype not included already (as of Version 1.1.3 Noter supports txt, org, md, java, py, and js), or you can choose to override all bullets and just assert your own for all files.
Again, Noter is meant to adapt to your system, instead of you to Noter. There's a few adjustments on how to use Noter that might make it even easier:
As usual, I'm encouraging people to try out Emacs. Org-mode has been particularly useful for note-taking, so I would really recommend it. To use Noter alongside org-mode, I suggest you keep a notes.org file in a directory of choice, and then add it to your agenda. You now have a file that has some or all of your TODOs, which you can access via the agenda, instead of having to switch to it every time you have a note to add.
If, like me, you like having separate files for different categories of notes, which are in separate directories (I have /Work, /Code, and /Personal directories), you could set up three versions of Noter, each with their own targetFileName, and place them into their respective directories. This is particularly helpful if you have more than one notes file that you tend to use.
Alternatively, you may have (or want to have) a single doc that keeps all your notes.
The current version of Noter is already useful enough to make a difference, but there's some obvious possible improvements. I want to work on other projects for the time being, and I also wouldn't want to complicate the simplicity of noter, so these new features may come along slowly. Many of these would likely be new branches, as they might need some experimenting with, so make sure they don't overcomplicate Noter, making it a system out of itself, which we want to avoid! Anyhow, here's some planned features:
I.e. being able to decide where in the file a new note is added. The most basic form of this would be just to specify somewhere that isn't the bottom of the file, but it would also be worth trying to specify specific locations on demand (so as to be able to group notes by category in a single file)
I.e. having more than one default destination for notes, specified either by an argument when starting the program or as a prompt after writing the note.
I would have implemented this earlier but calling cat on my terminal does the easily enough, so I didn't bother. A way to make it a fun feature would be to display a random note/task. I've used dice rolls to choose which task in my to-do list I'll get to first, so this feels slightly more worthwhile than a re-do of cat.y, C, o
I.e. being able to run Noter and specifying targetFileNames, bullets, etc. instead of having to rewrite a java file and recompile.
I.e. moving out of a terminal and into a window of its own. This does turn it into a program/system more than anything else, but it would also be a lot less of a hassle for a lot of cases.
I.e. rewriting Noter on elisp (for use on the Emacs command region), or just plain C.
I'm open to any suggestions or pull requests!