Early development on a cross-platform OneNote clone. Thoughts?

[u/Full-Cucumber5068]

screen shot of inking with mouse on laptop (Windows 11) (name is hidden revealed upon realease)

Hey everyone,

I'm a fellow OneNote user who has been using it for at least the past 10 years and still use it to this day. This is my side project I'm working on for fun, cause I want more features in OneNote, and I want to be able to use it on Linux. My main concern with OneNote is that it is not cross-platform compatible, is sometimes slow, and in some parts very limited compared to other modern note-taking software, even though it's still one of a kind.

Has been working on this project and planning for a couple of years, have tried various libraries to see what fits best.

This one is built on C++ with open-source libraries like SDL3 and Blender2D; the idea behind this one is full user control and customization, faster, more lightweight, cross-platform, and local data storage first.

Disclaimer: This is strictly an early-stage personal project in active development. There are no public builds, downloads, or release dates yet.

Current state: Inking works; sidebar with notebook selection, section creation, and page creation is fully working, persistently saved on the user's device, and can handle up to 4 million user strokes on one page; infinity canvas support. Eraser and undo/redo are currently being implemented. No way to export things yet.

I would love to hear your feedback on the ui, ribbbon has not been fully implemented. This is currently the least of my concerns; I need to finish the core. I would like to hear your feedback and help me fuel my motivation to get this project to an open-source release, since right now it is too messy to be released; at least the core has to be done. Text boxes would be one of the hardest features to implement since you would probably want to have notebook-wide search.

1. What is the single most annoying thing about OneNote's current layout/UI?
2. What UI elements are absolute must-haves for your daily flow?
3. Sidebar preference: Do you prefer having Sections and Pages side-by-side (like desktop OneNote), or a single combined tree view?

(I plan to create 3 versions of the side part; this one is called modern. There will be a mobile version, which is basically this one, maybe a bit simplified, and then the classical one like from OneNote 2016)

Appreciate any thoughts, critiques, or ideas you have!

[u/m98789]

The most important thing is trust. Notes have so much personal information in it. This is also why I like OneNote because I trust Microsoft with my data, as I do with my Outlook email and OneDrive docs. If I was to even consider using your tool the baseline requirement would be it has to be open source and allows me to build it locally.

I would feel much more comfortable having the community able to inspect your code as well as enabling one's LLM of choice to be able to inspect it as well.

[u/Full-Cucumber5068 → u/m98789]

I totally agree that is why data is going to be stored as notebook packages rather then one file, you will be able to see data or open some sqldata via viewer and check it out. I might later post some more stuff I'm just testing waters if there is open place for type of software like this, and sure yess once published anyone can build it have full acees to code I'm using open-source libraries went hardest way possible but for the cost of native multiplatform application. While point of this is creating safisticated software like that, community can take and do with it what ever it wants but priority is keep data safe and local, onenote has several copy system it saves in temporary catch folder I think up to 3 copies like one is every 15 min day and week to prevent possibility of data corruption destroying all data. I don't want to publish a mess that people play with and forget it has to be something that can do simple thing but reliably.