Textbundle (-ish?) Notes

First, congratulations on the new DEVONthink to Go 3! Nice app and an instant purchase. However, it does make me think (once again) that the biggest thing holding me back from putting all of my notes into DEVONthink is the lack of Textbundle (or something similar) as a means to write text notes with images directly in DEVONthink. Methods mentioned in the forums previously (whether manually dragging images into an “assets” folder and then dragging into a Markdown document, or switching to a different format like RTF - ugh!) always seem less than ideal, and I keep going back to other apps (most recently, Bear) when I want to take my own notes. Perhaps if there is resistance to allowing Textbundle-type notes, you could implement something like Obsidian has, where an image can be dragged into a note, and it gets auto-saved to a default folder. Anyway, I would love to see it. Thanks for listening. – Doug

My solution to a “bundle-ish” is to create separate records for the note, images, …
Then Data > Group Items to create a group

Indeed! This is the method I’ve used and advocated for years as it’s essentially the same kind of structure you’d use with actual web content. (Plus it makes sense to me to segregate a document and its attachments. :slight_smile: )

I can never seem to make that method work. It always seems to slow (it requires me to fuss with files when I really just want to be taking a note), and it clutters up a database. It just seems like some sort of “native” Markdown+ format for Devonthink would really improve note-taking, especially on the mobile app.

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How does it “clutter up a database” when you are using groups to degregate the data?

I think people like me want Textbundles as it is like a RTF/D but in markdown and the contents can simply be unzipped for access to the plain text data and files / images instead of this rich text html based format.

I think what we want is an apple note taking environment inside devonthink but in markdown, and the text-bundle format is the tool we see enabling us to have that 1 file/document per note.

I think this is why soo many people like the bear note taking app but they really really wish it had the devonthink advanced search.

TLDR: We want to replace apple notes / bear with DEVONnthink. (soon I hope once the new editor comes in a 3.x release)

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Maybe it just comes down to personal preference, but I just want a note to be an actual note, not a folder of files that I have to manage. I think @Miwagner1 explains it better than I do: DEVONthink’s anything bucket combined with a well-designed Markdown-based note format would be the ultimate note-taking/save-everything app.

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Totally agree! One document for the complete note please!

And TextBundles give us this in the realm of Markdown - I have asked for this quite a while ago already.

Admittedly TextBundles haven’t gained a lot of traction in the tech community, but they are a standard and are adopted by some other tools, e.g. Bear.

So I would love to have support for them in DT!

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Textbundles are technically not one document for the complete note, just as RTFD is not one document. They’re actually the solution I advocate with smoke and mirrors making it appear as one file. This is also the way DEVONthink databases appear to be one file.

Just saying.

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For an “actual note” I convert to

  • Formatted Note; items are embedded in the note
    or
  • Rich Text with Documents; items (attachments) display embedded in the note, but are stored separately in the OS note file package

smoke and mirrors is what makes a great user interface :smiley:

Beauty… or greatness :wink: is in the eye of the beholder.

Terminal isn’t beautiful by most peoples’ standards but it’s certainly a great app.

Textbundles are technically not one document for the complete note , just as RTFD is not one document. They’re actually the solution I advocate with smoke and mirrors making it appear as one file. This is also the way DEVONthink databases appear to be one file.

So why not add in support for one more bundle-type format? DT3 reads and writes so many file formats, and yet it can’t even read the Textbundle format correctly (no images). I’m not sure why there is a reluctance to support Textbundle in DT3, but hey, your own Markdown+ file format would work too! :grinning:

Anyway, I will continue to believe that DT3 and DTTG3 need a native Markdown+ file format for note taking. And since all the other formats have too many negatives (especially RTF/D), I guess I will continue to use DT for some things while looking elsewhere for a good, quick note-taking app. Bummer though.

Doug

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All right… fine I’ll start using tags for the first time in my life ever to appease my ocd :sweat_smile::rofl:

First time tags ever made sense to me to use lol

Edit: And images will not load when viewing from tags.

If you’re referring to images in textbundles, this will be addressed in the next maintenance release.

In a folder :open_file_folder:

What’s the Markdown source look like?

Snippet of the document. DEVONthink Mac created the links with drag and drop. I removed the image name.

# Model  

Model should be filled out with the model of the printer. Enter it exactly as it appears, lack of spaces/spaces and all. It can be found at the top of a configuration or network page.  
![](image1.png)

Do you have file extensions showing in DEVONthink?

Ah ops, I’m in the mobile version… it’s fine on the Mac version.