Heptabase

Posted by Alexander Deliyannis
Feb 21, 2022 at 04:37 PM

Thanks Steve!

The basic premise of Heptabase reminds me of the –now defunct as far as I understand– CRPA, Constructive Recollection Philosophy Application (previously PMM, Personal Memory Manager) discussed here in the past https://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/2996/

As with CRPA, one can create various visual combinations of selected items (cards in Heptabase). CRPA didn’t have a timeline (which I find very useful), but it had a similar library of all items created.

Heptabase can be considered as a rich text Zettelkasten system (each card to link to others), combined with concept mapping. I use Brainstorm in a similar –non visual– manner, but I do see the advantages of visual implementation, provided that it can scale well.

Overall, I like Heptabase. I also have concerns with the business model, but given that it’s backed by Y Combinator, I believe that there is reason for it.
While exporting is not yet supported, Heptabase creates daily (?) local .zip backups which seem to include all cards and boards as markdown files, so there is no risk of lock-in.

Stephen Zeoli wrote:
>With Heptabase, you write notes in cards… which can be anything from
>short shippets to long documents. You can format your notes using
>markdown. You can view your notes in a timeline, with the newest notes
>on top. Or you can view your entire card library, which can be filtered
>down quickly, as needed.
> >But the big feature is that you can add notes to whiteboards, which are
>canvases on which you can freely move your notes about, including tying
>them together with links to form flow charts or diagrams.