@bowline / @anon41602260: great links. Thanks for sharing those.
I think Roam might have hurt itself here. All the hype without any paying customers seems to have led to the emergence of a ferocious market for graph-based notes. They gave up their first-mover advantage for attention…
I didn’t say it was for me. But comparing Roam to only the highest-level tier of a product that (a) isn’t available, (b) is in alpha invite-only testing and (c ) has lower-priced tiers seems… unproductive
Does nvultra do all the fancy backlinking that Roam Research does?
It supports [[wiki-style links]] and has a “relatedness” view that prioritizes linked-to notes over other notes.
He stated him self that he was trolling. And my autocorrect also turned “academic” to developer (idk).
To all:
I would suggest checking out the efficiency Roam provides, but I will be waiting for it to go full release before diving in any deeper. It is really efficient though. All other implementations of backlinks pale in comparison. And the block structure and mix-and-match nature of the transclusion system is very powerful for complex writing. Either way it is a piece of software to push the market further. Current I am still relying on Bear and my own Roam inspired backlinks and Keyboard Maestro workflow. It’s all manually triggered though (although still mostly automated).
He stated him self that he was trolling.
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But not for the $15/month pricing - that’s been discussed for weeks, maybe even months now, and I linked to the official Roam account tweeting it just 5 days ago. Regardless, you have to be chary of someone who thinks it’s somehow a good idea to blatantly troll potential customers.
I was just about to post this myself. It’s more than backlinks. Transclusion, sidebar, queries, etc. It’s really growing into a nice system. I really don’t get the bias against the way it is being developed based on user needs, and provided free. Whereas Obsidian (and the mythical nvUltra) is apparently alpha/beta, and developed behind closed-doors. Obsidian at its highest level will be DEVONthinkly priced. But people seem to be cool with that. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I don’t see user-driven development - I might if I had some notion of what the released version was going to look like. I do see hacks extensions and a seemingly random and sporadic addition of part-completed features (such as tables). I don’t see resolutions to commonly raised issues like mixed capitalisation (how can I make “Roam” and “roam” synonymous without having to alias each individual instance?).
I acknowledge that they are listening to user feature ideas, but surely they have some notion (no pun) of a core feature set?
As to free - it’s beta and essentially undocumented and unsupported. Nice (vine extremely nice) to use and play with, but not something that can be depended on.
I just stumbled into Roam by currently taking the mentioned BASB course. I can’t precisely nail it, it certainly is neither features nor looks, but Roam is giving me goosebumps. Entering stuff, knowing that it is connected to the rest of my knowledge has something calming and reassuring, like investing in myself on a level I am currently not comprehending entirely.
I immediately realiized that for this to really be useful, doing a good tutorial is critical. As of now, there are two courses for sale and two free ones available:
Nat’s course includes videos on basic Roam instructions as well as some very practical videos on how to use Roam for personal knowledge management, writing and productivity.
The course costs $99 but participants get a $100 Roam credit that can be used when Roam comes out of beta and starts charging.
More details can be found here – www.learn.nateliason.com.
You can get an idea of Nat’s style by watching a course video on how to outline a new article that has been made public – https://youtu.be/RvWic15iXjk.
Lukas, a German PhD student, has developed the Cite to Write course for people who want to use Roam for academic knowledge management.
The goal is to help participants accelerate their writing by using Roam to give them fast access to everything they’ve ever read and to reduce the work involved in pulling together the right sources and references.
The course costs $118.80 or 3 monthly payments of $46.80.
More details can be found here – www.cortexfutura.teachable.com/p/cite-to-write.
Shu Omi is a data scientist and writer who has produced some excellent videos on Roam. He has now packaged his videos into a free course on Roam which can be watched on his website here – www.shuomi.me/blog/roam-research-course-a-complete-guide – or via the YouTube course playlist – www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLralmZwl_8jJuJMIebWFqm6K5I20a5Qve.
The videos require some existing knowledge of how to use Roam.
He is going to teach what he does in the process without requiring any money in return, so be sure to check back when the course goes online. for now, there’s only the summary video there, which is quite impressive and motivating in itself. For more info check out the Reddit entry for the course with the proposed TOC.
I’ve been dabbling (ok, falling head over heals) with Roam this past couple of weeks.
I have a workflow question, as I am finding I am putting a lot of ideas and thoughts into it, but I often get distracted by work ‘work’ throughout the day.
How do you keep a track of notes/blocks that you may have started and not completed in a structure like this?
Are you entering everything directly into the Daily Pages and then going back at the end of the day to review (and #tag?) any ‘#incomplete’ notes so you have a running list of ideas to return to?
Oh, and just one other question whilst I am here…the #tags and [[links]] are I understand interchangeable and do exactly the same thing. Have you found any subtle differences in using the two? I have seen in some of the videos people using both and was curious why you would do that?
Thank you.
@mat
This looks awesome but no indication whether it will be paid or free, or when it will appear (he said a while ago that all the videos were done already but he is certainly building up the suspense). If its a lot cheaper than the Nat Eliason course I’m in. A bit dubious about the “Roam credit” on the latter too - seems like vaporcredit…
You might be able to use it on nvUltra 
I use a “TODO” block on the page and tag with the context in which I am working.
The only difference between hashtag and double bracket is the look. Brackets are emphasized and hashtags fade into the background. Use them how you like. I use them as they are traditionally conceived in other software. Brackets are used for pages that I will actually write on, while hashtags are for pages that will just collect backlinks.
I love the software too, but am finding it difficult to use for everything until the data stability is achieved. I currently do “real” work in Bear because of the bracketed links. When and if Roam goes live in a stable form I can easily transfer over. I have also created a series of iOS shortcuts within Bear to replicate the backlinks and a couple other features.
Now you have my interest…!
I use bear but probably not well enough. The kind of stuff going into Roam I would previously have made a conscious split between Bear for substantive notes and Notes for quick snippets.
I am really enjoying Roam at the moment. It is a breath of fresh air. However if Roam falls over for whatever reason or is horrendously expensive when launched then it would be good to have solid alternatives having finally tasted the concept of multiply linked notes. Should the developers price it as a premium product without premium polish they will take the risk of losing potential customers. How they fare once one of the other notes apps figures out bd links will also be interesting.
Despite Conor’s (Cofounder) braggadocio, I really doubt it would be made public without have the core features well established.
As regards the features, most can be replicated in some way by more established platforms but I doubt to the level he wishes to push them. I think transclusion, queries, and the side-bar are more fundamentally significant than the backlinks (though all three features require the backlinks foundation).
Given Conor’s vision it has the potential to be quite revolutionary. The 15$/Mo price point has been the suspected price for a while now. But the predicted release date has been moved a few times already.
Just got an invite for Obsidian. Well, an invite, I have to connect to a Discord server to get it, and I’m really not sure I’m willing to jump through that many hoops for the “privilege” of beta-testing stuff.
The Discord site is Obidian’s support forum, so you would probably want that outlet anyway. Signing up is no more complex than signing up for Discourse sites. The downloads are actually on a Dropbox site – the link is posted in the Discord site along with release notices and ability to chat about the release.
Okay, thanks for letting me know, that’s good to hear! I was a little bit afraid it would be an onboarding à la Superhuman.
And they’ve got a limited time, lock-in, 50% off early-bird pricing deal right now. Don’t know if they’re still doing this, but when they made this same offer a couple of years back with Dynalist they said you could drop the service after buying into early-bird, then come back at a later date and still get the lock-in pricing.
Thanks!
Okay, you got me all very interested in this solution now 
will test it tonight I think and report back in a separate thread. (But be afraid. I’m very opinionated with my notes apps )