While I have seen this done several times before, this is the first time it has been done with a clean interface and limited options... making this the clear winner already.
Jakob, you did a great job. A couple of suggestions.
1. Make it visible when the text cannot be saved. Nobody wants to lose his work because of Wi-Fi glitch. In my version of notepad I implemented this with a light yellow frame around the textarea. I'm sure there's a better way to do it.
2. Imagine you could type a note into an address bar, hit Enter and have it added to your notepad. It's easy to implement, and it works really great for saving page URLs. Here's how I did it with a similar service of mine. Define a keyword search (e.g. "g hello world" - Google Search, "s hello world" - add a note), in Opera it's trivial - right-click the text area, select Create Search, and pick a keyword, I guess in other browsers it's doable too. The POST request carries the name of the page and a note to be added. It might sound simple, obvious, useless, but try it and there's a chance you'll love it.
3. List of my pages in the sidebar. Like, when I prefix my pages with "alisey." they go to the sidebar. E.g alisey.links, alisey.snippets.
In fact, for a high-latency connection like mine, it'd be nice to have one color to mean "trying to save" and another meaning "failed to save". Or maybe copy Gmail's "server request pending, are you sure you want to navigate away?" pop-up.
It looks neat, and is the sort of thing I both wish I'd thought of first, and wish had the source available so I could run it (for myself) on my own server. This would be a lot better than my current solution for saving scraps of code, notes, or other digital ephemera, but most of that I can't put on someone else's storage.
I really like how you can add a password in a non-intrusive way. I mean, it doesn't force you to use it but when you need it, it's really easy to add one :)
And by the way, when I want to save things for myself, I hacked a little snippet:
my-ip/whatever-category-1/category-2/whatever i wanna save
-> And it saves it. I can then access it on my-ip : )
While I don't personally have a reason to use this, I'm sure a lot of people will find it quite useful.
One suggestion though, the user should be able to select their own URL if possible, and if they want to. I know it'll pose some security risks, but having a totally ridiculous address is going to make your notepad less than memorable.
There is a link to change the URL below the notepad. It validates and confirms that the name isn't taken and then renames your notepad and redirects you.
Alternately, you can just visit any URL you want and (as long as it's available) start using it.
Great job jacob. It's very clean and straight-forward. I like how it instantly creates a shareable url. I've been working on a similar (though not exact) concept on the side for a few months now. Demo: http://bulletxt.com/demo
So, I tell here what I am looking for: maybe someone will find it interesting and want to implement that.
I have android phone and few linux desktop. I want to be able to record notes (simple unformatted text is good) and maybe even voice recording on my phone and have them appear via widget on my desktop transparently.
There are webapp that kind of let you do something at least remotely similar (oi notes, astrid, springpad, evernote) but none of them offer a good set of API that would allow me to have a transparent client.
Stupid question... but if I put something personal in there... what's to stop you from reading it? I mean... you could steal my million dollar startup idea. Or is that the plan?
I can definitely see myself using this in the future. It has a very similar feel to dropbox in that it "just works". If you need some support developing an iPhone/iPod/iPad app for it, which I think would be a great idea, I would be happy to lend a hand.
Great idea. Is there a write up on this? A blog entry at least?
Some sort of 'about' so users can find out who wrote it, and what (if any) T&Cs and privacy there are, is probably in order, at least to keep the lawyers at bay.
just came across this as it was being used for the froyo port to cdma hero by xda folks, and think it's awesome. something cool to do might be to make it like tomboy notes where you can link between notes, though this probably defeats the purpose.
and as an aside, would make for a great faceplate page, or at least humorous. or be able to add some code to the <head> and let it redirect to an OpenID Oauth so that the addy could be used as an openID. might need to specify admin versus guest on that (like a drop.io type setup). speaking of, is this searchable by search engines (or hidden like a drop.io)?
Awesome... but what is the difference between the URI of the page (notepad.cc/test) and the "share this" link URI (notepad.cc/share/ASDF123)? Why aren't they the same? Different security? Different expiration lengths?
pretty simple, i like simple user interfaces. one thing that kind of sux is that you have to manually erase everything in the canvas if you want to start a new document. would be nice to add something to the effect of "start new txt". noticed that with a new tab, it seems to save the session data.
need to fix the multi-document feature. otherwise i like it, "share" rather than save. abstraction of the storage layer is great, i don't even want to know where it's stored, just give me access.
The idea was sot of just that you go back to notepad.cc (the index) to get a new auto-generated URL, and then you have two that you can edit. "Start a new doc" is just notepad.cc, or creating one in on the fly by just going to the URL you want.
In that regard, your browser offers multi-document support (via tabs or bookmarks, or delicious, whatever you use to remember the URLs).
[+] [-] duck|16 years ago|reply
As a developer though I prefer http://gist.github.com
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alisey|16 years ago|reply
1. Make it visible when the text cannot be saved. Nobody wants to lose his work because of Wi-Fi glitch. In my version of notepad I implemented this with a light yellow frame around the textarea. I'm sure there's a better way to do it.
2. Imagine you could type a note into an address bar, hit Enter and have it added to your notepad. It's easy to implement, and it works really great for saving page URLs. Here's how I did it with a similar service of mine. Define a keyword search (e.g. "g hello world" - Google Search, "s hello world" - add a note), in Opera it's trivial - right-click the text area, select Create Search, and pick a keyword, I guess in other browsers it's doable too. The POST request carries the name of the page and a note to be added. It might sound simple, obvious, useless, but try it and there's a chance you'll love it.
3. List of my pages in the sidebar. Like, when I prefix my pages with "alisey." they go to the sidebar. E.g alisey.links, alisey.snippets.
[+] [-] xom|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mitjak|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stefs|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zakuzaa|16 years ago|reply
Is it possible to get the files sync to dropbox? may be through dropbox api?
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] patrickryan|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] charliepark|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] oskee80|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] techsupporter|16 years ago|reply
Time for me to get coding, then, I suppose? :)
[+] [-] omarchowdhury|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] d0m|16 years ago|reply
And by the way, when I want to save things for myself, I hacked a little snippet:
my-ip/whatever-category-1/category-2/whatever i wanna save -> And it saves it. I can then access it on my-ip : )
[+] [-] jlgosse|16 years ago|reply
One suggestion though, the user should be able to select their own URL if possible, and if they want to. I know it'll pose some security risks, but having a totally ridiculous address is going to make your notepad less than memorable.
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
Alternately, you can just visit any URL you want and (as long as it's available) start using it.
[+] [-] chime|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] PawelDecowski|16 years ago|reply
If you hover to the right of the text box, a sidebar with basic formatting options appear.
[+] [-] crocowhile|16 years ago|reply
I have android phone and few linux desktop. I want to be able to record notes (simple unformatted text is good) and maybe even voice recording on my phone and have them appear via widget on my desktop transparently.
There are webapp that kind of let you do something at least remotely similar (oi notes, astrid, springpad, evernote) but none of them offer a good set of API that would allow me to have a transparent client.
[+] [-] mustpax|16 years ago|reply
I really like the iPhone app but I don't think it has any other native apps.
[+] [-] hellweaver666|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _bfhp|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] andrewcamel|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] s2r2|16 years ago|reply
But what I really wanted to say: there's a link to http://www.tumblr.com/?notepad that's kind of dead (?)
[+] [-] LaPingvino|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deadkenny|16 years ago|reply
Some sort of 'about' so users can find out who wrote it, and what (if any) T&Cs and privacy there are, is probably in order, at least to keep the lawyers at bay.
Out of interest, where is the data stored? Cloud?
[+] [-] mtnchkn|15 years ago|reply
and as an aside, would make for a great faceplate page, or at least humorous. or be able to add some code to the <head> and let it redirect to an OpenID Oauth so that the addy could be used as an openID. might need to specify admin versus guest on that (like a drop.io type setup). speaking of, is this searchable by search engines (or hidden like a drop.io)?
[+] [-] thebigshane|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] epynonymous|16 years ago|reply
need to fix the multi-document feature. otherwise i like it, "share" rather than save. abstraction of the storage layer is great, i don't even want to know where it's stored, just give me access.
[+] [-] jacobbijani|16 years ago|reply
In that regard, your browser offers multi-document support (via tabs or bookmarks, or delicious, whatever you use to remember the URLs).
[+] [-] ComputerGuru|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] keane|16 years ago|reply