November 11, 2006
1:41 am
Helipad: Web based Notepad
Do you ever wish you could quickly write a note, to-do list, or organise a bunch of ideas on your computer… but access them anywhere? Do you find uploading documents to web sites annoying, and just want to write?
Alex Young's —”Helipad is an online notepad. It has several features that make it unique:“
- Notes can be organised with tags, and you can give tags colours to easily find them
- There’s an unobtrusive auto-save that helps protect you from computer and browser crashes
- You can read and write notes on your phone with your phone’s web browser
- There’s an API, so developers can use their applications with it
- There’s an add-on API, so developers can create themes and plugins
Helipad lets you customise it to the extreme. It really is your own. You can radically change the interface, or add your own features. Signup to Beta test Helipad
Helipad, Web based Notepad
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My needs are not that advanced. I don't need a notepad that tries to guess what I am trying to input (like one of the notepads I tested). I just need something that provides simple formatting and organizing capabilities and access from anywhere (including mobile). The simple sharing capability is also nice.
The 1MB limit is not an issue for me. So far I have 13 documents that total 8K.
You don't get the utility of the service because it does not fit your needs. So far, this works the best for me. Something else may come along that I like better.. and then I may change.
If you can suggest links to alternatives, I'm always willing to look at other options...Tom
I looked at Helipad again, and found that it can take HTML - see a test public page http://pad.helicoid.net/document/public/172eeaa5
It's not WYSIWYG, which is the main reason I won't use it, though textile is a solid choice to offer. A bunch of panels on a single page doesn't seem like a good approach to organizing notes, multiple tabs would be better. What's with the measly 1MB storage limit?
There are so many web services out there that do notes, including dozens of bookmarking sites that can take notes but also provide many more capabilities. There are over a dozen advanced note services such
clipmarks (look at stylehive if you want something REALLY advanced).
I just don't get the utility of this service.
"Fussy AJAX"? I don't know what you mean, could you explain? Actually, Google uses persistent HTML connections, which is more advanced - it allows pushing data back to the browser.
Google notes is too much fussy ajax code. The wiki-esque edit tags in Helipad provide a simple way to organize note content.
Nice service, but I don't see the incremental value over what is already there. Google Notes is very utilitarian, semi-heirarchical, and has solid backing. It will become more and more integrated with the Google service family as time passes, and seems like the logical way to go to me.