linuxmint / sticky

A sticky notes app for the linux desktop
GNU General Public License v2.0
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Notes has no save option and does not reliably save #108

Open nav9 opened 1 year ago

nav9 commented 1 year ago

I'm using Notes in Linux Mint 21 Cinnamon. When I type some notes into a sticky note and click outside the note, I would expect it to get saved. But immediately after, when I use halt -p at the terminal to shutdown the computer, and after I start the computer again, I notice that some of the latest sentences I typed into that note are not there anymore. So either you need to ensure that the notes get saved as they are being typed, or you need to provide a save button and/or a Ctrl+s option to save the notes.

For now I'm so disappointed with Notes, that I'm just going to create a file with GEdit and use that file to store my notes. That's a lot more reliable.

ps: Another little reason I didn't like Notes, was because of the limited color options you have. I wanted to create some less-conspicuous grey coloured notes. Rather than provide a limited number of color options, you could provide a color wheel to allow users to choose any color they like. There are various tools which will automatically pick the right foreground color for any chosen background color.

collinss commented 1 year ago

Initially it would save immediately, but due to some performance issues in some cases, I added a delay (3 seconds iirc) to reduce the number of times it saves while the user is typing. I don't ever use halt -p, so I don't know the specifics of how it works, so it could be that it's forcibly closing the notes before they have the chance to finish saving. If you wait 10 seconds before shutting down or closing the app, and you still get content that isn't saved, it could be that there is an error that sometimes prevents the notes from saving properly. You can see if that's the case by running the sticky notes in a terminal (you'll need to close the app first) and then see if any messages show up in the terminal after you've typed something.

As for the color options, I'm open to adding new ones if they look good, but I specifically didn't add the option to choose your own color because there is no way to ensure that color would look good since each color option actually uses several colors for readability and contrast purposes (ie, text color, scrollbar and handle, etc all need different colors to be usable, and there is no formula that I know of that will make it look good for every color possible).

nav9 commented 1 year ago

I had uninstalled Notes and started using a text file after opening this issue. So with respect, I'd leave it entirely to you to decide on what to do. The rationale of the 3 second delay is ok. Another option would be to keep the auto-save interval configurable, and allow the user to choose when to save, by providing a tiny save icon and recognizing Ctrl+s keypress to save. As for a formula for colors, there is one: https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/107318/formula-for-color-contrast-between-text-and-background