Agreed! I’ve no doubt Devonthink and others are great products, they just don’t fit me, just like Obsidian likely won’t fit many people. And that’s why we have multiple products to choose from 
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I would argue that you’re not, in the case of DT. Especially when we’re comparing it to Obsidian, you “put in” structure (folders, etc). You “put in” tags to DT. If you just copy your data to another location, that structure and those tags are all gone as they’re not stored with the file. The program can do a separate export that preserves those things, but the data on-disk isn’t portable as-is. Or put differently, restoring from a backup in the future won’t work unless you have a copy of DT to interpret its proprietary database.
You can get around the tag issue by actually using #tag syntax like you do in Obsidian, but you can’t fix the folder structure unless you’re indexing an external folder - which isn’t without its own set of risks and challenges.
The format of Obsidian data is generally human-readable as-is, and all data related to a given file is in that file, not in an external data store that you can’t access. That file is also in a particular place in the folder structure, and that structure is there whether you’re using Obsidian to access it or not.
And again, the data in Obsidian is link-able in one’s own head if you just look at it. There aren’t any weird hash IDs or anything. Links are to files, the files are named in the link, and Obsidian auto-updates links upon file rename. So any data moved out of Obsidian at a later date will have link integrity preserved.
That’s the big thing. If your data that you’re working with can be represented in plain-text Markdown, Obsidian is fantastic. If you really need to work with other types of data, especially proprietary formats, not so much. DEVONthink will “index” a mind map file and find the buried text in the weird data format. Obsidian, to the best of my knowledge, won’t touch it.
That’s what I was getting at above. The lack of data portability provides benefits in DEVONthink - it’s just a matter of whether the tradeoffs are worth it.
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If I drag a folder created in DT out of DT onto my desktop, the folders and documents are all preserved. I don’t do tagging, so that’s not an issue for me. And it’s an “extra” function supported by the app, so it’s basically function, not data.
People do a lot of “extra” functionality in Obsidian, especially with plug-ins, but none of that data is preserved, either. As far as basic data files and folders, you get out in DT what you put in, just like Obsidian.
The same “in one’s own head” benefit is true if you don’t use any program like Obsidian or DT. If you just put brackets around words in markdown files you have the same supposed “benefit.” I don’t think that’s a real “benefit” at all.
Right. If you do a manual export DEVONthink creates a folder hierarchy like the one that’s in the app. But if you’re looking through a backup drive with data, your DEVONthink data store will be absolute gibberish while Obsidian’s folder will look just like it did in the app.
If we’re saying “future proof” means “you can export something in a usable format”, then I would think that even proprietary apps with proprietary data formats could be said to be “future proof” as long as they offered some sort of plain text export.
Right. And that’s the whole point. If you just delete Obsidian, or stumble upon your Obsidian archive on an old backup drive five years from now, you can make sense of your data with almost no effort. Tags, folder structure, everything - it’s there.
The same is not true of an app like DEVONthink.
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We’re obviously going to disagree about this. As far as I’m concerned, I get the same data out of DT that I put into DT, and I’d get the same data out of Obsidian that I put into Obsidian.
I don’t care that DT puts my data into a proprietary database for all the functions I get out of DT. Worried about disaster? No, not at all. I have backups of backups, so no worries.
If I insisted on every app keeping my data exactly as I input it, I wouldn’t be able to use hardly anything. It’s a non-argument to keep harping on that point.
From my standpoint and practice, Obsidian and DT have the same level of practical “future-proof,” regardless of technical hair-splitting and semantics.
And that’s fine, as long as you’re good with it. I’ve conceded above that DT provides a number of benefits in return for the proprietary storage engine. I think that in the same way it’s fine for you, it’s not fine for others - which, as mentioned above, is why we have different apps for different folks.
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Well, the tag itself would be data, would it not? It is metadata for the document or file. The ability to add and manage these tags would be a feature, but the tag itself I would say is still data. At least, that’s the way I’ve always thought of it, although now I’m curious if others on the forum think differently.
100% agreed, that’s why we need to pick our battles. For example, my notes are mostly data that I’ve created, with some references to data that others have created. Thus it makes sense to keep the data exactly as I’ve inputted it, because that’s what I’ve intended for it to be. Of course, different use cases/workflows/etc would lead to different conclusions than the one I’ve reached, which is understandable.
I’d also like to clarify, in the most respectful way possible, that nobody is trying to force you away from DT and into Obsidian I think what most people in this discussion are trying to point out is that by design, Obsidian is more open/future-proof than DT by default, and that is important to some people. However, it does not have to be important to everyone, and it does not make Obsidian objectively superior.
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Thanks for your note.
Yes, I understand, “nobody is trying to force you away from DT and into Obsidian.” Likewise, I’m not trying to force anyone away from Obsidian to DT. I think both programs have their uses.
On the other hand, I do think that OOS (Obsidian Obsession Syndrome) exists, and it appears to me that some have grossly overstated the benefits of Obsidian.
My only real point in this thread was to point out that from a practical user’s perspective, Obsidian and a program like DevonThink have basically the same “future-proofing,” in that in both apps you can easily get out of the app the same files in the same format you initially put into it. I get that Obsidian text files remain in a folder on your hard drive. Yes, with DevonThink you have to either export your data, or select and drag it out to the finder. Big deal. To a user not splitting technical hairs, that’s just as “future-proof” as Obsidian.
You make some really good points, and I think this gets to the root of toxic productivity.
If we didn’t listen to all the tech podcasts, YouTube videos, blogs, etc., would we be convinced based on our everyday use that Evernote totally, completely, absolutely sucks? Probably not. But, it is no longer cool to be an Evernote user. Instead, all the cool folks are using Notion, except they don’t use it anymore because all the cool folks are now using Roam, except they don’t use it anymore because they now use Obsidian.
First world problems.
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I’ve tried to get on the Obsidian band wagon. Was really excited for a while. It is a capable, configurable, and extensible Markdown editor. But when the glamour wore off, I realized that its killer feature (backlinks and unlinked mentions) didn’t seem to help much for the kind of notes I take. Plus you still need an everything bucket to go with it. At this point I’m sticking with EagleFiler for my everything bucket and Byword for my Markdown editor.
Hmm, I would’ve thought most of us who left Evernote lived through Evernote between 2012 and 2017. It was a once-great app that fit the early iPhone+Mac/Windows environment of the time, that became really frustrating to use. The founder had to step down for basically running new development into the ground and losing control of quality issues, and it took two CEOs to make progress on the turnaround. It has improved since then, but now it has a lot of competitors, so there’s no need to return to it.
Trying to run counter to perceived bandwagon narratives is unhealthy. Just take good information where you find it and use what makes your life easier and helps you accomplish what you want to do. Some of your moves will line up with what other people are doing, and that’s okay. Some won’t—also okay.
You can do long notes in Obsidian. That’s how I use it. I do not use atomic notes. They have never worked for me. Like you, I developed my own system of note-taking. I’ve practiced it for 40+ years of doing journalism (college paper included).
That said, I’m constantly fiddling with that system so maybe I’ll start doing atomic notes at some point.
Also, Obsidian recently started hiding markdown syntax–it shows you formatted notes.
Nope, you do not need an everything bucket to go with Obsidian. You can store your non-markdown documents in the Obsidian vault, and link to them in Markdown. It is what I do.
I’m not trying to convince anybody to use Obsidian. I use it because I like the ability to link between notes. I like the way it implements tags. I use those two things lightly, but they are nonetheless extremely useful to me. I use it because it works with the native Apple filesystems. I like that I can link to documents in Obsidian vaults. And I think it is a very nice editor. Others will disagree with me, and that’s OK.
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This is a good point. It works well for many folks and Obsidian does recognise the files’ presence. For me it didn’t work: the lack of any means of previewing e.g., a word document within Obsidian and the lack of any kind of search within them made it less useful. Maybe that has/will change, although most of the applications that support this tap into MacOS functionality such as QuickLook.
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@MitchWagner, you’re not wrong, and I love Markdown files for notes, but I do not want to have to view all my PDFs, JPGs, and .EMLs, etc. through the lens of “Map of Content” Markdown files. I want them to be first class citizens of my everything bucket. I’m with @nationalinterest when he says…
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Obsidian is the tool I use to write, organize, and store my notes. Devonthink is the document repository for my paperless office—I’ve got everything from bank statements to legal agreements to tax returns to spreadsheets in there. I also use Devonthink to index the folders where I store my digital libraries —e.g., my obsidian notes, research articles, books (PDF & epub), audiobooks, videos, images, etc. (Yes, you can listen to audiobooks and watch videos in Devonthink, although I usually open the file in my default app for the media type …) Why index Dropbox and Finder folders in Devonthink? So I can use Devonthink’s tools for searching and surfacing connections between things.
Note: there’s a difference between storing something inside a Devonthink database and using Devonthink to index the files you’ve stored elsewhere, although pretty much the same functionality is available to you either way.
In short, Devonthink and Obsidian play well together.
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What does a link to a PDF in DEVONthink, for example, look like in a Markdown note in Obsidian?
I insert the Devonthink UUID for the PDF into an Obisdian note the same way I’d link to a website: item name in brackets, UUID in parentheses. When I click on the link, it takes me to the PDF in Devonthink. That is, it doesn’t take me to the file folder where I’ve stored the PDF (because I’m indexing), but rather to the item’s entry in DTP. From there I can read it in DTP or open it up in another app.
What does it look like in the Markdown note? (I don’t know what a DEVONthink UUID looks like.) And is it resilient – does it withstand changes to the title or location of the PDF?
Here’s a sample of what the reference looks like in an Obsidian Markdown note:
[Rawls, John, et al. A Theory of Justice. United Kingdom, Harvard University Press, 1999.](x-devonthink-item://946E4EAA-2F9B-46EA-B933-3EB529D576A4)
I put the MLA citation for the book inside the brackets, but you could put anything in there, just as you can for a web link.
If the file has been imported into Devonthink I believe the uuid is stable if you move it around within the database itself. If the file lives in a folder that’s been indexed, it’s a different story. Indexing works best on files that more or less stay put. If you move an indexed file or folder without telling Devonthink where you put it, the uuid will point to a missing file.
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