A few months back, I encountered (Basic) bookmarks (https://bmrks.com/) and loved its keyboard-first interface, but lamented two things:

- It doesn't cater for non-Mac, so the primary mod key is Win/Super on Windows and Linux, making it unbearable.

- Its usage is limited to storing hyperlinks.

I would have happily made a PR, but it wasn't open source, either. I decided to make my own, and JustJot was made.

Along the way, I decided to add todo items with checkbox, which ended up being the most frequently used item type.

This is project is not revolutionary in terms of technical implementation. It runs on React, TypeScript, Sass, with the backend powered by PocketBase (which I tried for the first time and ended up really liking). I also had a lot of fun collaborating with my co-worker (Casey, an UX designer) to flesh out its UI.

Things I'm currently not happy with would like to work on:

1. Markdown support: one of my friend mentioned this, though I have not come up with any idea on how to use this effectively. This app is not trying to be a feature-rich editor, and using markdown without some sort of preview is not going to be very useful.

2. Security and privacy: this is something my co-worker mentioned, and I completely agreed. As of now, with me and Casey being the only active users, this is good. But it is a fact that as an administrator, I am able to access all user's data.

I'm thinking of two potential approaches:

- Encrypt all data content: This is obviously my first thought, but I'm not sure it is realistic or possible to encrypt database data, while also storing encryption password somewhere that would make it impossible for me to access (which I probably would occasionally need for debugging).

- Making it self-hostable: this is more viable, though this would likely involve a lot of rewriting, and repackaging both of my repositories into probably one single binary executable (which is what PocketBase does).

3. Offline operation: I have an idea of what is needed to be done, but the thought of writing another versions of the frontend logics entirely, and sync them with the online mode, is one hell of a hassle. So far I've been okay with this thing not operable offline, but this is on my todo list.

4. Data export/import: This is the most straight-forward and easiest. I have a very good idea of what to be done, just not the motivation, because it does not bring a lot of values to me currently. I will get around to it sometimes.

I created this for myself and have been very happy with this. I hope it could be useful for someone in some way, too.

I had the thought of running a Discord server to receive more feedback from people who might be interested in and using this, but neither me or Casey is having the bandwidth to moderate it. That being said, if you'd like to use it and have a channel to speak to us more directly, please drop me a word.

The app: https://justjot.app/

Frontend source: https://github.com/JunoNgx/justjot-frontend

Backend source: https://github.com/JunoNgx/justjot-backend