Laverna is a free, privacy focused note taking solution for various desktop and mobile operating systems, and the Internet.
What sets is apart from solutions like Evernote is that the service does not maintain servers of its own.
In fact, you can use the application without account registration, and may even download a web hosted version to host a web version of it on your private server for access online.
The application is open source, and versions of Mac, Windows and Linux are provided currently. These versions use Electron as their base which means that they are quite heavy when it comes to memory usage for instance.
An Android version is currently being worked on, and preview versions are already available.
Laverna
Laverna displays several options during first start. You may import data from Laverna, useful if you want to bring notes from another device to the computer you are installing the note taking application on, and may enable synchronization through the third-party services Dropbox or your own storage if you want notes to be synced across devices automatically.
Laverna uses remoteStorage for providing you with options to add your own storage to the service.
You are asked to set up a password that encrypts the data on start on top of that, and are asked to enter the password whenever you launch Laverna on the system.
The application displays all notes in a sidebar on start, and a preview of the selected note in the main content area.
Notes are stored in notebooks that you may create in the application. You can edit any existing note, or create new notes. Both options open the editing interface which displays the markup code on the left and a preview of the actual note on the right.
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You may change the view mode to distraction free or normal mode at any time.
Formatting tools are listed at the top. You can use those to add lists, images, links, or modify the appearance of text.
Notes are saved automatically, but you may save them at any time as well.
Once you have added some notes to the application you may star some notes to highlight them better, and also use the search to find notes of interest quickly.
The program comes with a trash for deleted notes, and a separate option to create and manage tasks.
While you may use the mouse to navigate the application, you may also use key bindings to do so. Edit for instance is mapped to the “e” key, the new note option on “c”, and “g f” jumps to the favorites notes right away.
Laverna does not require an Internet connection for the note taking and management part. Some features, like Sync, won’t work without Internet though but those are optional.
Verdict
Laverna is a powerful note taking solution that takes user privacy seriously. While it is not yet as advanced as Evernote or other long standing note taking solutions, it may be an alternative to users who use note taking applications but want a solution that puts them in full control of their data.