Type Anywhere (Floating Text Boxes on a Page)

Features
1

I'm currently trying to find an alternative to OneNote, and one thing that I really enjoy that I can't seem to find anywhere else is the ability to type anywhere. That is, clicking in a blank space on a page outside of an existing text box will create a new default-sized textbox that can be resized and overlaid other textboxes.

I took a look through the plug-ins and didn't see one that seemed to offer that sort of usage. Did I miss it and there's actually one available? Is the option to have pages be floating boxes of markdown (or a page from a technical stand point just being a collection of floating pages on a single page) a possible feature in Joplin?

1 Like
2

I did some searches before making this post but apparently I didn't use the correct terms as it looks like the exact feature was requested back in 2020: Writing in Any Position of Paper - #2 by CalebJohn

Mentioned there was the possibility of plug-in support given a new interface, perhaps? Is that still a possibility? Perhaps something akin to a JSON stored at the top of a page that gets ignored by the interface and parsed into the floating text boxes with coordinates, sizes, depth, etc?

4

In the hunt for a OneNote replacement I was hoping that Joplin might be the answer. However, like you, I’ve found that this feature is remarkably hard to find in other apps and, really, the one that might be my deciding factor as it’s somewhat indispensable for my workflow.

Any chance you’ve discovered a way to make this floating-textbox feature work in Joplin? I know I’m a bit late to this post, but here’s to hoping you have!

5

@Belhaloth Unfortunately, I haven’t, not really.

I got crafty with Tables and made some modifications to the stylesheets for Markdown to get things to appear the way I prefer.

image
image905×442 44 KB

It helped, but nothing quite like being able to just drop a text box somewhere on a page. My stylesheet, if you’d like to give it a look, is like this:

.mce-item-table:not([border]),
.mce-item-table:not([border]) caption,
.mce-item-table:not([border]) td,
.mce-item-table:not([border]) th,
.mce-item-table[border="0"],
.mce-item-table[border="0"] caption,
.mce-item-table[border="0"] td,
.mce-item-table[border="0"] th,
table[style*="border-width: 0px"],
table[style*="border-width: 0px"] caption,
table[style*="border-width: 0px"] td,
table[style*="border-width: 0px"] th {
    border: 1px solid #bbb;
}

ol {
    list-style-type: decimal;
}

ol ol {
    list-style-type: lower-alpha;
}

ol ol ol {
    list-style-type: lower-roman;
}

ol ol ol ol {
    list-style-type: decimal;
}

ol ol ol ol ol {
    list-style-type: upper-alpha; }

    thead li {
        list-style-type: disclosure-closed
    }

    li {
        margin-bottom: 0em;
    }

    blockquote,
p,
h1,
h2,
h3,
h4,
h5,
h6,
ul,
table {
    margin-top: .1em;
    margin-bottom: .35em;
}

blockquote {
    opacity: 1;
    border-left: none !important;
}

tbody {
    vertical-align: top;
}

td:has(s) {
    text-align: center !important;
}

td>s {
    text-decoration: none !important;
}

thead,
tr,
td {
    &:hover {
        background-color: unset !important;
    }
}

h1 {
    color: #a6ccf7;
    font-size: 2em;
    text-shadow: 1px 1px black;
}

h2 {
    color: #789fe9;
    font-size: 1.7em;
    text-shadow: 1px 1px black;
}

h3 {
    color: #5c82c7;
    font-size: 1.3em;
    text-shadow: 1px 1px black;
}

h4 {
    color: #577aba;
    font-size: 1.1em;
}

(There might be a better way to ensure tables aren’t dotted lined, which I hated, but this worked and so I didn’t revisit it)

Since Joplin appears to use HTML rendering on the WYSIWYG editor, I’m fairly certain it’s possible to make floating text boxes, I just haven’t tried writing a plug-in myself yet, and make do for now. I ultimately couldn’t hold out in OneNote any more after how bad it was getting.

6

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly! I honestly didn’t expect a response since I don’t see the floating text functionality talked about much online.

In any case, I tried saving your stylesheet code and I’m not sure what I’m missing, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be seeing; Tables still seem stuck in line with the body of text. Admittedly, I’m a total novice to making these kinds of adjustments and coding, so it very well could be error on my part. Also, when I do try using Tables in the rich-text editor and toggle back to markdown, my Tables disappear completely and leave just the text.

It’s true OneNote (and Microsoft) is not ideal for so many reasons, and I would love to not have to compromise on its functionality. I’ve peeked at Obsidian and it has floating text boxes, but I do prefer the interface of Joplin, so I guess I’ll be left having to choose.

Thanks again!

7

Sorry, the stylesheet doesn’t do anything to get tables floating, it mostly just makes sure that tables don’t have dotted boarders, and also does adjustments to headers and ordered lists to make them more consistent with some OneNote defaults.

If I ever take a stab at making a floating textbox plug-in for Joplin I’ll be sure to send you a message!

8

Oh, I see. Well, I kept playing with them and it does manage to make them look nicer, haha.
Either way, your help is much appreciated and, if you do ever take a crack at it, all the best of luck!