this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2025

366 points (97.7% liked)

Open Source

40861 readers

145 users here now

All about open source! Feel free to ask questions, and share news, and interesting stuff!

Useful Links

Rules

Posts must be relevant to the open source ideology
No NSFW content
No hate speech, bigotry, etc

Related Communities

Community icon from opensource.org, but we are not affiliated with them.

founded 6 years ago

MODERATORS

Cloak@lemmy.ml

kevincox@lemmy.ml

CrypticCoffee@lemmy.ml

Lettuceeatlettuce@lemmy.ml

366

VOID — my FOSS second-brain app (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by Transhumanist@lemmy.ml to c/opensource@lemmy.ml

166 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hey folks! I’m completely new to Lemmy and still figuring out how everything works around here... But I’d love to share a project I’ve been building.

It's called VOID (Versatile Open-source Infrastructure for Developers) - an open-source, local-first second-brain (note taking app but more powerful) application that combines the flexibility of Obsidian with the powerful organization of Notion.

Unlike many other tools, VOID is not just another note-taking app. It’s built with the idea of being a true second brain that you fully control. No vendor lock-in, no hidden cloud, no feature walls. Everything is open-source, customizable, and designed to adapt to your workflow instead of forcing you into someone else’s.

I'm currently building it with Rust, Tauri v2 and Vue.js. For certain plugins and configs, it also supports SurrealDB as a database.

check it out on my GitHub

top 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] PoisonedPrisonPanda@discuss.tchncs.de 111 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Unlike many other tools, VOID is not just another note-taking app.

no offense. but if I got a penny for everytime Ive heard this....

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 37 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

no offense. but if I got a penny for everytime Ive heard this…

yeah, I know) but I try my best to make this project as perfect and useful as possible

[–] PoisonedPrisonPanda@discuss.tchncs.de 28 points 1 month ago (2 children)

for everyone who walked this path of finding (or making) the perfect note app. there is no general perfect. everybody will find eventually a workflow which works - and evolves.

but I whish you all the best and that you may built an app which inspires many. :)

load more comments (2 replies)

[–] vort3@lemmy.ml 33 points 1 month ago (1 children)

the idea of being a true second brain

It's good that it's built with this idea, but what is the actual implementation of this idea? What features make it «a true second brain» that other «second brain» apps (obsidian and hundred other note taking apps) don't have?

[–] ilinamorato@lemmy.world 30 points 1 month ago (20 children)

I did a bunch of research into second brain/zettelkasten apps (that is to say, apps that support note taking with note interlinking and rich text) earlier this year, and I couldn't find a single app in the category that's (1) FOSS, (2) stores notes as .md files natively (Logseq will import/export to .md, but it's not native), and (3) is cross-platform in some way (for my purposes, I need it to be on Linux, Android, and Mac OS, or have a usable web app). Even the ones that get close all have some kind of gimmick to them, or are super ugly or slow or otherwise hard to use.

If Void can get those three nailed, and do it in a usable way, it will fill a very particular and exciting niche.

[–] chemikyle@lemmy.zip 15 points 1 month ago (2 children)

This is a mandatory comment about Emacs' org mode since .org files are extremely similar in syntax to .md and can be interconverted extremely easily.

load more comments (2 replies)

[–] Ferk@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

Considering that one of your requirements is already using .md files, which is a format pretty common.. maybe a combination of different apps on different platforms would work? Specially considering that mobile UIs are likely gonna have different requirements than desktop UIs.

One approach I was considering was using neutrinote on Android (which is a relatively simple but functional no-bullshit markdown editor supporting cross-linking between markdown files) and VSCode / VSCodium on the desktop (which also supports cross-linking, and I think has some note-taking related extensions), or maybe zed, or whichever editor you might already be using that can support markdown. Then use syncthing for the sync.

However, I have not yet really gotten into it, primarily because second brain/zettelkasten note-taking in general has never really fully clicked with me, most of the time when I take notes I just use them as a scratchpad / temporary storage.. without much of a proper organization ... just a note meant to be scrapped as soon as it's acted on. Often I just use tabs in my notepad app, without really saving them to a file.

load more comments (2 replies)

load more comments (18 replies)

[–] dax@feddit.org 21 points 1 month ago (2 children)

You might want to highlight what differentiates it from Obsidian, except being open source. Just from looking at the page, I don't know what it means to have organization capabilities from Notion?

[–] int32@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 points 1 month ago

Yeah, the readme says stuff that don't mean that much. Sure, all FOSS and no cloud but WHAT DOES IT DO??

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 month ago

Thanks, i’ll rework README in the near future.

[–] pastermil@sh.itjust.works 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Looking good!

Slightly off-topic, but with all the craps that's going on with Github, ever consider having your projects on Codeberg instead?

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

can you tell me in short what’s wrong with GitHub? I totally missed it

[–] oscarmeyer82@lemmy.world 14 points 1 month ago

MS bought it and is folding it into their "AI" division

[–] Tundra@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

The more the merrier - have you had a chance to try anytype out?

they have this local sync function that works even without any internet (sort of like a LAN?)

its been really handy for me as I often work in places without internet, but retain the ability to sync between laptop & phone.

(Also are notifications and kanbans on the roadmap?)

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yes, tried anytype, but I struggle with it’a lack of plugins and overall extensibility. As for kanban and notifications, yep, they are already on roadmap

[–] Tundra@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 month ago

brilliant, Im excited to try it - cheers for sharing it with the world for free.

[–] ComradeMiao@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago (2 children)

A new competitor to Obsidian other than Trilium and Logseq would be awesome. I have to ask are you vibe coding? The length of the project and extensive use of emojis in the read me makes me question… I wish you the best. If you get a server container and an iPhone app I would seriously support it.

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 25 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

I tried to make README less boring using emoji) And I’m pretty confident in my Rust and Vue skills, so not using chatGPT(or any other AI tool) in my work). I wrote all of the VOID by my hands.

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago

no hidden cloud

Shots fired at Notesnook.

[–] oyzmo@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Nice :] sounds great. Any chance you will create a Flatpak?

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 month ago

Yep, 100% I will! But a little bit later, cause for now app is still WIP

[–] hperrin@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (8 children)

Is it a notes app? Second brain doesn’t mean anything to me, and I don’t understand what it does from your README. The name is also confusing. What does it mean by open source infrastructure?

load more comments (8 replies)

[–] mysticmartz@lemmy.world 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Markdown support, plugin ecosystem, automation?

[–] Transhumanist@lemmy.ml 11 points 1 month ago (8 children)

Full markdown support, all notes are just .md files like in obsidian. I’m currently working on plugins api and trying to implement layer that would allow obsidian plugin’s compatibility. Automation: I don’t really understand what you’re trying to say, can you specify please?

load more comments (8 replies)

[–] gon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 month ago

Cool!! Will definitely check it out.

[–] BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I have one suggestion so far. Consider moving to Codeberg. Github has become a very unsafe place to keep FOSS projects.

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] hansolo@lemmy.today 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (4 children)

There's already many foss notes apps.

What none of them do well is syncing and collaboration without paying for hosting or self hosting. Joplin lets me workaround this with 2 Dropbox files (1 per profile, 1 being a shared profile) and it's a pain. And the Dropbox file isn't encrypted.

An encrypted API access file I can shove anywhere and use would be lovely as an option. Anyway I can share across users would be lovely.

[–] cygnus@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

What none of them do well is syncing and collaboration without paying for hosting or self hosting.

Not to pick on you here, but you're surprised that nobody is bulding an app for free and then paying for a server to also give away for free? Open source devs already struggle to make ends meet - now they're supposed to operate at a loss?

load more comments (1 replies)

[–] communism@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 month ago (7 children)

What none of them do well is syncing and sharing notes without paying for hosting or self hosting.

What about Notesnook's monograph functionality? Unless you mean sharing as in collaboration not publishing

load more comments (7 replies)

load more comments (2 replies)

[–] Resonosity@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Good luck with the project! I hope it becomes everything you want it to be, in time!

load more comments (1 replies)

load more comments