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Lesson 12 — Writing, Notes & Bookmarks

Tools for capturing thought, organising information, and saving things for later. Sources: vendor/nixproject/modules/home/apps.nix (Joplin, LibreOffice) and vendor/nixproject/modules/home/webapps.nix (Memos, Linkwarden).

Joplin — Markdown notes

Joplin is your primary note-taking app — Markdown-based, synced via Nextcloud, available on both laptops. Launch from the app menu or: 

joplin-desktop

First-time Nextcloud sync setup (per machine)

  1. Open Joplin → Tools → Options → Synchronisation
  2. Synchronisation target: Nextcloud
  3. WebDAV URL: https://next.wilsoz.com/remote.php/dav/files/<YOUR_NC_USER>/Joplin
  4. Username: your Nextcloud username
  5. Password: a Nextcloud app password (not your SSO password — see lesson 14)
  6. Click Check synchronisation configuration → should say OK
  7. Click Synchronise — first sync pulls all existing notes

After this, notes sync automatically every few minutes and whenever you make changes.

The interface

Left panel    → notebooks (folders) tree
Middle panel  → note list
Right panel   → note editor (Markdown) and/or rendered preview

Toggle between editor / split / preview modes with the toolbar buttons or Ctrl-L.

Writing notes

Joplin uses standard Markdown: 

# Heading 1
## Heading 2

**bold** *italic* `code`

- bullet
- list

1. numbered
2. list

```code block```

[link text](https://url.com)

Useful shortcuts:

Shortcut Action
Ctrl-N New note
Ctrl-Shift-N New notebook
Ctrl-P Search everywhere
Ctrl-L Toggle layout
Ctrl-B Bold
Ctrl-I Italic
Ctrl-K Insert link
Ctrl-S Save (also auto-saves)

Install from Tools → Options → Plugins → search. Worth adding:

  • Rich Markdown — live rendering of bold/italic/headers in the editor itself
  • Note Tabs — open multiple notes in tabs
  • Outline — sidebar showing headings for navigation in long notes
  • Quick Links — @[ autocomplete to link between notes
  • Automatic Backup — extra local backup beyond the Nextcloud sync
  • Kanban — turn a note into a kanban board (good for project tracking)

Memos — quick scratchpad

Memos at https://note.wilsoz.com is for quick captures that don't need to live in a notebook structure. Think Twitter-style stream of short notes: ideas, links with context, quick to-dos.

Open it from the Memos PWA launcher in your app menu (opens in its own Chromium window).

Writing a memo

  • The input box is always at the top
  • Markdown works: **bold**, - bullets, `code`
  • Press Ctrl-Enter to save
  • Tag with #tagname anywhere in the text
  • Attach images by dragging or clicking the attachment icon

Finding memos

  • Search bar at the top searches full text
  • Click a #tag to filter by tag
  • Use the calendar view in the sidebar to browse by date

When to use Memos vs Joplin

Use Memos for Use Joplin for
Quick capture, don't know where it goes yet Structured notes in notebooks
Short ideas, links, reminders Long-form writing, documentation
Things you might search for later Things you actively organise
Twitter-style stream Wiki-style reference

Linkwarden — bookmarks

Linkwarden at https://read.wilsoz.com is your bookmark manager with automatic page archiving — it saves a copy of the page content so bookmarks don't go dead.

Open from the Linkwarden PWA in your app menu.

Saving bookmarks

Browser extension (recommended): Install the Linkwarden extension in Firefox/Chromium. Click it on any page to save with one click. Set the server URL to https://read.wilsoz.com in the extension settings.

Manual: In the Linkwarden UI, click New Link, paste the URL.

Organising

  • Collections — folders for bookmarks (work, recipes, NixOS, etc.)
  • Tags — cross-collection tagging
  • The archived copy button (document icon) shows the saved snapshot of the page

Searching

The search bar searches titles, URLs, and archived page content. This is the key advantage over browser bookmarks — you can search the full text of pages you saved even if the original is gone.

LibreOffice — office documents

For board documents, agendas, spreadsheets, and anything that needs to be shared in .docx or .xlsx format.

libreoffice                  # launcher with file type chooser
libreoffice --writer         # word processor
libreoffice --calc           # spreadsheet
libreoffice --impress        # presentation

Key compatibility settings

When sharing with people who use Microsoft Office, save in the correct format:

  • Writer: File → Save As → Word 2007-365 (.docx)
  • Calc: File → Save As → Excel 2007-365 (.xlsx)
  • Impress: File → Save As → PowerPoint 2007-365 (.pptx)

Set this as default: Tools → Options → Load/Save → General → set "Always save as" to the Microsoft formats.

Useful shortcuts (Writer)

Shortcut Action
Ctrl-S Save
Ctrl-Shift-S Save As
Ctrl-P Print
F5 Navigator (jump between headings/tables)
Ctrl-H Find and replace
Ctrl-1/2/3 Apply Heading 1/2/3 style
F11 Styles panel