An Open Letter To Notion
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- Опубліковано 30 вер 2024
- This one's overdue. I use Notion for managing all of my content and most of my business. I wish it was easier for me to recommend.
Here's the tweet that everyone replied to with their issues: / 1737611433360425087
Huge shoutout to Phase for this edit 🙏 - Наука та технологія
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Hey Theo, this is Anderson here. We watched your video here at the HQ and really, your suggestions are amazing and valid. We gathered the entire team, did an in-depth analysis, and came up with the perfect solution for all your problems: just uninstall that crap and go find another app! ❤
true if it were a video about painpoints in google software
😳
😂
What a burn 😂
Any good alternatives you can recommend? I've been wanting to switch off of Notion for a while but there's nothing I've found that's as powerful with databases and such.
You briefly mentioned AI features xD I’m so sick of them and everyone getting egregiously excited for something that the only thing we’ve used it for is asking “Who was what animal in the meeting we just had” All I want is a usable UX. Teams get so focused on adding in a bunch of overhyped garbage because it’s often times more difficult to actually fix the buggy software in a way that makes it reasonably usable.
Plus I plan my day in bed from my phone so a non-helpful mobile calendar is 100% a non-starter for me.
I'm ditching Notion with high hopes for Obsidian this year. I don't use the database tools nearly as much as Theo, and the poor performance and feature-bloat really wore on me. As someone who hung on to Evernote longer than most, I'm stoked for something with more of a "notebook" feel.
Obsidian for viewing and providing some extra functionality like data view and Neovim with the Obsidian plugin is the comfiest combo I’ve tried so far.
I ditched Notion for Obsidian about a year ago for my personal notetaking, journaling, etc and it's been really incredible. I try and use a GTD workflow for things, and the sheer lack of friction in starting up Obsidian and getting my thoughts down immediately has been life changing. For teams though, I've seen Notion work well for folks and I'm not sure how well Obsidian would do there.
@@zehph Oh wow, I didn't know there was a Neovim plugin! I use VIM mode and it's great but I'd really like to navigate around Obsidian like I do in Neovim. What's the plugin called?
The problem is that Obsidian is a different thing. Notion's databases works out of the box whereas if you want to have the same with Obsidian you need to configure a whole bunch of plugins and stuff.
@@jarnathan-snowpreference definitely comes into play. I'd rather have to add the features I want manually than have a bunch of features that I don't want and can't disable
your zoom level is boomer level magnification
Perhaps it's a screen sharing from a small display?
@@ivanjermakovno, he prefers 720p
That's what I thought the whole video
I love Notion. I get why it's in this weird middle area between adding new features while also trying to make sure that performance doesn't suffer. I just worry that eventually it will become a software that just becomes "ok" while market share disperses into more niche softwares.
It tries to do too much and started putting all the stuff too quickly, having multiple databases being load is something to be handled with more care.
It is pretty and convenient, but slow and to top it off the notes are not end to end encrypted.
Great and all... but now, get in a call with one of their product managers and live stream it. There is a very high likelyhood they're all discussing majority of these features internally. I can't take Theo's word when he say's things like "I can guarentee this would make it better" until we hear perspectives from Notion themselves on their decision making process. They're the ones with the analytics and perhaps, we are their audience niche and catering to our needs might end up messing up their larger audiences. To me, this isn't an informative video, but would be interesting to see how things progress from here.
I thought I was the only person frustrated with how the focus has shifted entirely to AI, I remember right before the AI hype started, they stated in one of their updates that they’re working on improving task management by having a place to view all todos but that seems to have been scrapped, also there’s still no way to set recurring reminders.
First part (720p) is quite niche IMO and irrelevant: it's like saying that Notion doesn't work on my Garmin Watch.
You can't please everybody too. The rest are valid points that I do totally agree on.
Glad to see them invested on Twitter tho! Thanks for that tweet that made things move forward too. 💚
Is a small screen niche for such a tool? I bet it chills on a small second screen for most people
But same is for big 32 inch screens. They don’t use any space at all. And if you enable full width it isn’t centered.
It’s bad ui/ux
@@moritzschuessler even if you have a cheap tiny 22" second hand monitor, it's still in 1080p nowadays yo. Era of 720p is long gone.
If elderly people (an example) are on 720p still, they are probably not using Notion anyway. So no, I cannot see why a good amount of people would be chilling on a 720p monitor in 2024, it being on desktop or laptop. Most tablets are also having a good enough time on that one tbh. 32" inches doesn't mean anything by itself, just the size of a monitor, can still be 1080p.
I run several 27"+ with QHD/UHD and it's totally fine tbh. Just zoom if needed.
bro could cmd+- and get more stuff on screen when necessary
@@kissu_io I don't think so. I know quite a few people during undergrad who got cheap 720p monitors as their first one for their setup.
Not saying they're popular by any means, but they are relevant enough to be designed for.
Not sure if complaining about real-estate is viable when you yourself use an ancient resolution with what seems 50000% zoom. Not the best UI but the horizontal spacing is really not that bad, a line of text justs covers up so much of your screen.Feels like IE users complaining about shit not working in IE.
Obsidian for markdown content + Baserow for advanced tables, kanban & calender view. Awesome Combo ❤. You can self host Baserow and even embed multiple baserow views in a Obsidian Canvas its such a nice experience.
Is there a guide somewhere on how to do this?
Figured it out, the extensions page for Baserow within Obsidian explained it well
I wish Notion would add vim key bindings. It’s a big reason I like Obsidian
Don't get me started about how you can't use a formula as a primary field. So God forbid you want dynamic naming conventions, which is so easy in airtable
Notion was great until it was unusable. Painfully slow and no offline mode. Ended up hacking my Joplin client and using add-ins to get everything I need. I'm convinced it's best to just pick a solution you can customize and spend a bit of time making exactly what works for you.
It's crazy how Theo tolerates that calendar view for the sake of sticking to Notion. At least Trello is mostly abandonware, so you can just inject CSS to fix it knowing that the underlying HTML is stuck in time.Shout out to the Arc browser, btw.
Notion needs vim
DoomEmacs on evil mode to the rescue
getting reset to light mode after random sign outs was really bugging me too
I'm never in 720p; but I rarely have just one window open. *so* many apps are getting so bad with vertical space that its drastically reducing how many things I can have on screen at once.
I'm not using everything at once, but my ADD brain needs everything in front of me, as soon as I have to hunt for something my productivity is lost.
my problem with notion is that it doesnt excel in anything
calendar view pales in comparison to a real calendar app, task management same, document editing same, large amounts of data same. the mobile app is also horrible. on top of that, it's slow so there's almost no reason to use it. having everything in one spot is nice, but not when doing that makes managing everything impossibly slow.
You just asking for Jira 😂
Just don't use a resolution that is so small. Just use 1920x1080 that almost everyone else uses. Don't complain about "few characters" or "vertical space" if you're choosing a small resolution for yourself. Notion doesn't force you to use a resolution that was popular a decade ago.
I wanted to love notion and I tried, but I feel like it takes so much effort just to do the simplest things that I found myself getting so frustrated when I wanted to do something very simple. I know everyone loves it but it just kinda feels cold and clunky to me. Also, the fact that if I have no WiFi or cellular data access I can’t even access half of my databases. As much as I hate it, I went back to Apple Notes just because I could simply put what I need there and be done with it.
I left Notion for Craft and never looked back
Obsidian leans more into the plug-ins which enable to be much more than just the markdown Editor as well.
But the more you go on the Database features, may i suggest an actual Database ? Oracle APEX e.g. let's you do a LOT on top of your Data quite quickly.
Notion databeses are in this funny place where they're a database but still extremely readable and easy to interact with and non sophisticated. It's basically a middle ground between excell, actual databases and specialized note tool when it comes to it's database views.
You just can't emulate by going to the corners. Google sheets is the closest compromise.
Apex is aweful. Please don’t use it. Oracle did Oracle stuff
Wanna a a Tooltip to you entry in the Gantt view? Nope since the blocks won’t be fixed to a date when scrolling and zooming.
Wanna configure the gantt diagram? Keep it short! You don’t have many characters to do so
Versioning? lol what’s that
i just use notepad++
Hot take: Breadcrumb is actually useless.
Project managers, accountants or employees who work a lot, for example with the same Excel, project cards, do not use 13-14" inch displays with HiDPI 2. Complaining that the weekly plan does not fit on the screen is at least strange, take a larger monitor with normal scaling settings.
I ditched Notion, I wasted way too much time “organizing”. It’s physically painful. Mobile is practically unusable.
Editing experience sucks, because everything is a block. Copy pasting text from another app causes one giant block with new lines inside, which you have to manually remove if you want to have consistent spacing.
No offline mode. Complete deal breaker.
Obsidian is a clear winner for me personally if you want to actually write notes. Also I am easily able to quickly make notes from within my code editor and im not vendor locked.
The scheduling is something I would just get a dedicated app for like Todoist is super easy to Embed into Obsidian if you really need it. Very trivial to do project management
Notion has been great for me on desktop, and sooo slow and cumbersome on mobile.
Of the small-screen complaints, surely Cmd+minus would solve this. Your app font seems to be about 50% bigger than your system font.
And by the way, Theo, I don't know how zoomed in you are in this video but I couldn't operate like that. Some of the gripes you mentioned might be improved upon even slightly by zooming out. Just a suggestion
👀
Evernote had burnt the cloud note-taking business. Anything is better than having a tool that can go belly-up anytime.
Also, I don't need to be online to write.
I agree with all of this so much!! I love notion and I use it to manage my entire life, it's the best tool I've found for my ADHD brain, but all these little things you mentioned keep adding up and making it harder and harder. I hope we can see it addressed fast.
When I close Notion and open it again (or when I shut down my PC), it should remember my last opened tabs instead of having to reopen one by one.
The random sign outs made me stop using Notion for a while. It's bananas that this is a problem.
Notion is that one app that I always have installed but never use
I agree with most of the points, but synced ordering between views is a pain to implement, would be unreliable, and would get in the way more than it would help. Even if it would be an opt-in feature. Telling as a developer who tried to implement a similar feature in my team's product.
"Cmd -" to zoom out and have more space 👍
Some of the new notes apps really are quite promising, but migration from Notion is nearly impossible. Their export is disaster level bad.
god i hate notion even just to type some light docs. the number of time selecting breaks (often selects multiple blocks instead of the text I want, then gets stuck in block-selection mode) on my is soooo aggravating.
I think it's worth mentioning that although you cannot drag and drop no-date items, you can click on them to have them added to the calendar and then drag them to the appropriate date.
3:35 THIS. Mobile Notion sucks. And I really wanted it to work. Am mean HOW you don't have moviel push notifications?
It's too sluggish
Have you got a plan for if Notion ever closes?
all software for weeb and desktop should be developed with 13 to 14 inch displays in mind then mobile then anything else.
for your date shifting issue at 08:07 - would a time line view with the projects set up with the "blocking" before and after feature fix that shifting? when you adjust one all the connected pages that have a before and after bock shift as well, depending on the initial setting when you make the view. It asks you how you want things to shift.
I know you want that to work on the view you're on, but maybe this could band aide things until they bring that feature to the calendar view?
NGL I don’t use Notion and this video makes me want to try it out.
Despite all the complaining in the video and comments (including my own), there is a lot to like about it -especially if you're coming from a simpler client and think you would use the feature set Notion provides
Wait, you made this video and you're not even their customer??? LOOOOL
Dude NGL but you kept saying "I don't want to just request features the whole video" but you did request features the whole time... Still, great video, I think it's cool to request features, but gee man just say that.
This was hilarious 😂 I love Notion and love how much they evolve and continue to improve. This is why they have such a loyal fan base. There are definitely things that need to be optimised but I also try to keep in mind that they are doing an almost impossible job of it being something they created as a note-taking/simple block-based software that now their ongoing efforts have allowed it to have so much more functionality, sometimes with a little creativity.
I think there's a reason why they're really the only note-taking and productivity platform with all this functionality, no other apps are even close... and they still continue improving and adding to the solutions they can offer by buying the calendar app and recently, Skiff (I think it's called). So if they can implement these suggestions... that'll be insane!
Hey Theo, I'm curious whether you've heard of Anytype. I'd tried Obsidian, Microsoft loop, raw markdown and they hadn't felt as natural as Notion did. I'd been using Notion for 4 years and my largest gripe was the fact that there never seemed to be a real desire to implement a true offline mode. I'm especially disappointed they didn't make it a priority after the 2021 outage. I should mention that Anytype has moved into Beta recently so it still has a lot to prove, but I've really enjoyed the experience so far and am very happy to know that Notion has some competition to hold their feet to the fire.
The integrations with things like Teams and Slack are far more than 'chat app integrations' surely, MS teams and 365 suite and Slack are probably 10x more fully featured than trying to do everything in notion to start with? As if Notion is 'just a calendar app' either. So if someone's not started their business using Notion from square one and need it to integrate with their existing workflows that use Teams or Slack etc, then surely these are not 'nice to have chat app integrations' and are essential to their mature processes. Much like the offline mode requirement, if you're spoiled with near universal internet access then this isn't something that matters to you, but does to countless people not as fortunate or working in more testing environments. Dealing with cached data and versioning is a pain in the ass to develop for but it's such a poor experience to assume everyone is connected to a fast and reliable internet connection at all times rather than store what is often only a few megabytes of local data.
Hey Theo, Agree with everything, I have been battling notion for a bit and i came across a video, about the drag and drop to the calendar that is useful (for desktop only)
essentially, you make a button that links to a page with a view of the same database in side peak (which you can set then filter etc within), then when you press the button the side peak comes in and you can drag and drop from the side peak to the calendar. Hopefully useful and not what someones already typed
A Offline local version would be nice. as well as a one time purchase option. i have been ripped off by cloud only services in the past
including arbitrary changes to Terms of Service and how hard it is to cancel subscriptions.
Can someone explain to me one thing?
If he's using an M2 Mac, why does he say that he's browsing the web in 720p?
I'm lost
I use AI and I hate how much it is passed. Okay so Notion Calendar app is great! But the way accounts and workspaces connect is whack. I mean I want to make team schedules and availabilities and so on.
Notion -> Normal MD is not supported, because it would make switching easier
So much of your pain points are solved in Airtable. Especially automations.
Re: the first issue... just zoom out?
Why are you using 720p? Just why.
This guy thinks he is Jonathan Blow but is actually a Javascript kiddie.
This mobile view is just like the apple calender view and its the single reason i completely dumped apple calendar
I use Notion for everything and don't plan to change- but Mobile is useless full stop
Also the Android performance is just bad
Notion is a dying fade, best to start your migration before their tech support is completely obsolete.
You can easily switch between light and dark mode with command shift L i believe
You keep trudging along. All us Obsidian users will keep laughing at your pain 😂
Saying that Obsidian is "a markdown note taking app" means you've never used it. It has plugins for calendars, task management, hell even making TTRPG's. Not to mention you're a web dev... Obsidian is electron, if it doesn't have something you want, you can just make it.
AFAIK the only thing Obsidian can't compete with notion on, is real time-collaboration. But at the same time since it's just text files, most tech savvy people get around it by just layering git on top.
I think this overall situation is going to end up like VScode (Obsidian) vs All other text editors (Sublime, Atom, etc).
Granted it's moving much slower, because the Obsidian team isn't Microsoft. But slowly and surely Obsidian will overtake Notion just because of the flexibility of the API and sheer diversity of plugins / people developing for it.
I dont use this but all these critiques sound extremly pedantic to me...
I was expecting more serious points to be brought up but these feel like nitpicks
Primeagen's tweet in the 2nd minute, among all the other serious tweets 😂
reject notion, reject obsidian, come back to org-mode
I'm mad because they bought Skiff.
Slowly notion will become atlassian, I see it happening slowly
Search is impossible now- it does not work at all for me.
Theo went straight to the manager on this one. Like a teacher that believes in you "I'm just disappointed...I know you can do better". It'd be interesting to know how many of these items was already on Notion's hit list but they didn't allocate dev time to it in favor for something that could help generate revenue or they already had development in the works.
Notion is the severely over-engineered in all the wrong ways.
Ooh, I'm early for once
Can't get over no tab support on their desktop app
You can do all that in obsidian
as a middle level laptop user I can easily say they need a ton of performance improvement, same in mobile. I can write 5 "quick notes" on google keep and notion would be still loading.
Sounds like @juxtopposed need to lend a hand
I tried Notion few times but couldn't hook. It is too complex for me. I use a more simple note system - Workflowy. Less features less complexity. It has single page zoomable interface. I am a paid user for I-don't-remember-how-many years.
Random sign outs are really annoying.
Swapped to Obisidian a few months ago and never looked back. Notion's privacy policies are still pretty meh as well. With Obsidian, installing the plugin and setting the cloud service for your notes will do everything you need from Notion and more.
I really need a second blue (lighter/turquoise whatever) and I need a white highlight/black text in darkmode to counter a black highlight/white text in light mode. This is nitpicky and I'm sure a lot went into this- but I also hate that the highlight colours and text colours are so different- why are they not the same? (like the blues are completely different etc)
Ok rant done
"TWO CHARACTERS. TWO CHARACTERS!" 06:08
I think Microsoft Edge has the option to put tabs on the left like Arc, if you want to.
Vertical tabs have been there for years. Too bad Edge became Microsoft bloatware, but it's still better and faster than Chrome. IIRC Arc is closed-source (and Apple first) so it's a no-go.
I genuinely LOVE notion AI and I see Notion Q&A as a true game changer!! I am on my way to learn about Notion Calendar and i am looking forward to it cause i was pretty bad before it...
And the exports are all fuck up... lol but it still is the greatest tool ever
Performance is what convinced me to drop Notion in favor of Obsidian. I know it's not the same, but I'd rather invest my time in a different software than getting locked in to a piece of software that becomes a drain after I'm over 5k notes.
I don't know if it's a coincidence, but since integrating with the new calendar, I've had issues with saved views/filters saving in general. Incredibly annoying
I have no idea if someone has commented this, the big problem with the weird behavior and performance issue is that Notion is using Electron and not using native APIs.
I quite like the AI, sure it writes your text but that's not what I'm using it for. I'm using it for support, I ask it questions and it answers. No, it's not perfect but it's the easiest and quickest way to ask support questions right now.
It’s the vertical space, Dave. And the content shift of sidebars. Two biggest issues
What!?!? Are you going to complain about excalidraw next?!?!
Don't make systems in notion, just use a lowcode for that(appsmith is my choice), use obsidian for notetaking and that's it...
I recently discovered AnyType. What do you think of that?
Get a bigger monitor
Dang I just came here after discovering Notion on Tik Tok. Was excited to learn notion but after this video… I’ll pass
Hey theo, why are you on 720p? any particular reason or just personal preference; kinda like cs pros with the 3:4 aspect ratios.
Makes videos much more watchable on mobile
@@theorantsso do you just change it for streaming/recording or you just live in it?
@@kenneth_romerohe changes it for streams/recording
This video renembers me how much I love vimwiki and configure things my own way despite getting beaten up everytime I break my configs