I really love Joplin, but lately I'm starting to feel it's not for me anymore. It still does the basic writing/tagging etc., but most, if not all, the new additions/tweaks are programmer (or at least techy) only. Things like plugins, API, Command palette, etc. So, I'm starting to worry that may be in the very near future it will need some skills I don't possess.
So I have a very simple question:
Where is Joplin heading regarding users skills? majority non-techy guys like me, or tech gurus? Either way it is not my place to discuss or object, after all it is an open source product, so the producers are free to take it wherever they decide. And either way I'll be happy for them and appreciate what they are doing.
I just need to know, so I can decide either to continue with Joplin, or find myself a more non-techy user friendly one.
Again, thanks for the awsome app.
I'm hopeful that the plugins work will result in benefits for us non-programmer users. It's new at the moment so the excitement will be for the developer type folks.
But hopefully they will develop a variety of plugins, some of which will no doubt provide great benefits for every type of user.
I would certainly be interested to know what is in the art of the possible in terms of plugins and if there is anyone out there actively working on something
Yes in case it's not clear the ability to install plugin is to extend Joplin and provide more features to users in general, not just programmers. I'm a developer obviously but I prefer apps that "just work" without tons of complicated settings, and I hope to make Joplin in that way.
the command palette is really more productivity based, and programmers love productivity, give it a try!
Plugins and the API are yes meant for more advanced users, but can enable said tech oriented folks to create stuff for non tech oriented folks. For example, the API is what allows the Firefox/Chrome browser extension to function, and plugins just literally came out, but its not unheard of to have something be created that non techy users would find useful too
The user interface was really bare bones, but personally i think it looks way more 'professional' now
markdown plugins ( a feature that has been around for a long time) enable certain features that even I don't use, but are meant for people like mathematicians / scientists / hardcore writers that want crazy diagrams and annotation support
what features do you think you are missing that would help non technical users?
My two cents: Plugins allow it to extend Joplin with new functionality. Look through Any suggestions on what plugins could be created? to get an idea what could be done with plugins - from adding a spell check to support musical scoring or better highlighting of conflicted notes.
As the latest releases have put quite some effort into making it possible to create plugins, and Laurent needed to find out how programmers would use such a system, there was much technical chatter. And probably quite a few programmers will use the plugin system and API to support their (programming-related) use cases.
I'd expect that in the next months, there will be some further discussions about the technical points ("Help me develop my plugin" etc.). Which will then gradually shift towards people announcing "Hey, I've built a cool plugin for XYZ, check it out!". At which point you can just download any plugin that interests you and see if it extends Joplin in a way that helps you.