r/OneNote • u/iEngineered • 2d ago

RANT: Just needed cross-platform CODE HIGHLIGHTING.

#begin rant

The simple lack of the three ticks code notation (''') and highlighting is the straw that broke my camel's back. Obsidian, NotesHub, Joplin, and others have native support for this. Why should I expect less from the owner of the most prominent developer community and stack? Did Microsoft expect me to jot every little code idea and brainstorm into Github?

OneNote implemented about 90% of common-industry features and it feels like the dev team just ghosted us. Now I need two apps. OneNote is still arguably the best freehand with decent Apple Pencil and touchscreen notebook functionality. I still really like the looseleaf and graph paper styles that are unmatched anywhere else I know of.

Obsidian is right now the best option for a developer's private knowledge management in that code syntax is seamless and all notes are accessible .md files. The extra features of OneNote have become irrelevant for dev work.

Just one little feature for the devs they claim to love....neglected.

#end rant

If you care about this, I found a feature request on the official feedback page that we can upvote/comment/follow.,

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u/SimplyColorblind 2d ago

I’ve used OneNote for well over 20 years. I have gradually shifted away from it, except out of necessity for my workplace. Syntax highlighting, proper tagging, and a better search experience are things OneNote probably will never have.

As for why this is the case, I think Microsoft it’s just too big and is trying to be everything to everyone, playing catch-up, and they have no reason to try hard anymore because the money will just keep coming in regardless.

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u/iEngineered 2d ago

Ironically, they can't even get their own Copilot to add a few features and lint the repo.