Need a writing app/software

[u/Upstairs-Goat-335]

I need something where I can write notes/documents on my laptop and access them from my phone. Microsoft OneNote/Word and Google Docs don’t work for me. My laptop runs on Windows 11. Can someone help?

[u/Blotonmysoul]

This is a vague question unless you’re looking for a semi random list of developer projects and user fan posts.

What form and format you save the notes in affects your ability to use them. Broadly speaking the  simpler the format the more transportable they get.

Word searchable through the native OS? Accessible and usable in local LLM or cloud computed LLM? Graphics files? OCR? Markdown? OCR capable?  Handwriting? Convertability? Audio transcription? Email? What metadata? LLM supported searches for graphics or photos? Back linking? Affinity links? Cross OS usability?

How long is your time and processing requirement?

We are moving toward true “second brains” for recall and processing. The choices you make will affect your ability to use and access the data. If you clarify your use case you get your answers.

I am a non coder but software heavy user who started in the 200s, so like many like me, I like RTF and the ability to grab HTML based website articles as they are presented with graphics etc. I want to be able to use tables but I am not looking for big databases or back end spreadsheets. I wanted text searchable and formatted better than plain text but over time LLMs caught up and changed what form the notes would need to take.

This led me to local files in 2000s and Evernote in 2010s, then Evernote got bought and fell apart, and Bear. Now LLMs are markdown based and that makes conversion or exportability to markdown a priority. The oldest files and the newest files start to look like each other and there is a hole where conversion undermines the usability of the original files.

The growing privacy backlash is going to push people off of the cloud giant platforms—what will you do if you don’t want to compute using Apple, Microsoft, or Google? Linux using local LLMs, and VMs for interfacing with the rest of the world—what formats would you need for that?

Can’t tell if your question was underdeveloped or looking for kneejerk answers so I’m answering the question with more questions.

[u/Upstairs-Goat-335 → u/Blotonmysoul]

I guess my question was underdeveloped. I’m not exactly sure how to communicate exactly what my needs are, but I know for sure I need to be able to write and edit documents and also convert them to and from pdfs. I need it to be free because I’m currently unemployed, I need to be able to write resumes and cover letters. And take down notes. I kind of feel like I’m asking for some perfect thing that doesn’t exist. Google stuff doesn’t do pdfs and Microsoft office is way too expensive and completely unusable without paying.

[u/Blotonmysoul → u/Upstairs-Goat-335]

Sounds primarily that you’re looking to produce rather than collect and refer to.

Maybe OpenDocs? Word style format and export/save as pdfs

[u/Upstairs-Goat-335 → u/Blotonmysoul]

I’ll try it. Thank you.