Kosshi is a new database-backed outlining.
https://kosshi.app

I write about it here:
Kosshi Is Database-Backed Outlining
https://bicycleforyourmind.com/kosshi-is-database-backed-outlining
#macOS

macosxguru

It looks great, and $25 for Mac/iOS/iPadOS seems very reasonable. Dev answered a couple of questions about it on Product Hunt.

https://www.producthunt.com/products/kosshi

Since text and images are saved into its internal database I wonder how it handles sync changes - if treated as a monolithic database file you're transferring a _lot_ of data with every small change.

And time will demonstrate the robustness and reliability of the database. I use a few cross-platform writing apps that use databases but they have proven themselves over years; even so, even longstanding apps have experienced issues with their databases and syncing so I'm wary of this approach with new apps.

Nice review on your website, macosguru.

Thank you Stephen.

macosxguru

I'm rather impressed – especially by the developer's careful explanation of his decisions (reminiscent of Jesse!).

I'm having a play, despite no longer using iOS...

Erm, where is your website? Sorry, sorry, appears at the top of this thread... d'oh!

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

Nice review on your website, macosguru.

Based on the review and trial, I bought a license for Kosshi and am super impressed. It does everything that I loved in Dynalist and Workflowy but on my own computer and syncing over iCloud, non-subscription. The first import of my huge outline required a little bit of time, but subsequent updates are very very fast, so I don't think it retransfers the whole database each time there's a change. For outlines where I need multiple columns or calculations or to use scripting, I'll continue with OmniOutliner, but for my mass of notes, this is great.

I bought Kosshi without hesitation, and enjoy it on macOS quite a bit. It needs to be better adapted for iOS though -- the app is very keyboard centric on macOS but most of those keyboard actions are not possible on iOS.

Oh, I'm so tempted, even though it doesn't (and probably won't ever) run on Android. It's really very nice, and I love the integration with Calendar/Reminders. But no, I'm not getting an iPhone just so I can play with Kosshi on iOS... that would be one CRIMPstep too far!

Paul Korm wrote:

I bought Kosshi without hesitation, and enjoy it on macOS quite a bit. It needs to be better adapted for iOS though -- the app is very keyboard centric on macOS but most of those keyboard actions are not possible on iOS.

One of the nicest things about Kosshi – and yes, it's a tiny thing – is that when you zoom in or out (it responds to the standard Mac Cmd+ - / Cmd + + keyboard shortcuts), it actually changes the font setting, rather than zooming in/out by a percentage. Since you can keep the Settings dialog box open while you're doing this, it gives you very precise control. For example, I use a couple of monitors on either side of my MacBook: they run at a slightly higher display resolution, so it's very convenient to put Kosshi in one of the side windows with a slightly larger font size. I can do the same thing with other PKM apps, of course, like UpNote or Obsidian, but both of those change the entire interface by percentages if you zoom in/out, whereas in Kosshi I can run the main editor font at 16px in a side window, or 15px on my main MacBook display.

Okay, okay – I did say it was a tiny thing :-D

... the other tiny thing that's really imaginative is "Prose" mode, meaning you can right-click any line to transform it into a simple paragraph without a bullet point – suitable, as the developer says, for long-form writing. What a small but sensible idea!

Super impressive first major version!

Did anyone happen to see if there is true daily notes support feature, or anything along those lines?

I feel once again stuck between apps, and it’s compounded by being stuck with windows at work, and simultaneously not necessarily wanting to dig myself deeper into the apple ecosystem. This and Notesgarden have got me thinking though.

I know what Kosshi reminds me of – Outlinely, a truly impressive MacOS and iOS outliner that was discontinued some years ago (2018) but does still run on modern Macs. I used it a lot – it was immensely powerful and had some great features, but Glam Software was never very communicative and after a few years the app just faded away... not entirely unlike another very good piece of software, Quiver (the "programmer's notebook").

In Outlinely, each document was in fact a complete outline, so you could manage a huge amount of information in it. It could also split documents between iCloud and your local hard drive, as well as shared folders. Ah, those were the golden days... heh heh.

As it happens, both Outlinely and Quiver are still on my MacBook. Though, they will possibly die in a year or so when Apple stops support for Rosetta. Kosshi is more feature-rich than Outlinely, especially with the calendar and reminders integration.