Alright, let’s talk about my rory setup. I’ve been messing around with this for a while now, and I finally got it to a point where I’m pretty happy with it. So, I figured I’d share the process.
First off, what is rory anyway? It’s basically a personal knowledge management system. Think of it as a way to organize your thoughts, notes, ideas, and whatever else you want to throw in there. I’ve tried a bunch of different tools – Notion, Obsidian, you name it – but nothing really clicked until I started building my own thing with rory.
So, where did I start? Well, the first thing I did was decide on the core technology. I went with Python and Flask for the backend because I’m pretty comfortable with those. For the frontend, I kept it simple with HTML, CSS, and a little bit of JavaScript. Nothing fancy. I wanted something that was fast and easy to use, not a resource hog.
The database was next. I opted for SQLite. Small, lightweight, and good enough for my needs. No need to overcomplicate things with PostgreSQL or MySQL right off the bat. Plus, it’s just a single file, which makes backups super easy.
Then came the fun part: building the actual application.
- I started by setting up the basic Flask app structure.
- Defined the routes, created the database models, and got the basic CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations working.
- For note-taking, I wanted something simple but powerful. I ended up using Markdown as the format and integrated a Markdown rendering library on the frontend. That way, I could write notes in Markdown and have them displayed nicely on the screen.
After that, I focused on making the whole thing usable.
- I added search functionality so I could quickly find what I was looking for.
- Implemented tagging to categorize my notes.
- Spent a good chunk of time tweaking the CSS to make the interface look decent.
Of course, it wasn’t all smooth sailing. I ran into a bunch of bugs along the way. Spent hours debugging silly errors, wrestling with CSS layouts, and trying to figure out why my database queries weren’t working. But that’s just part of the process, right?
One thing I really struggled with was making the application responsive. Getting it to look good on both desktop and mobile was a pain. I ended up using a CSS framework (like Bootstrap) to help with that. It made things a lot easier.
Security was also a concern. I made sure to sanitize all user inputs to prevent XSS attacks and used parameterized queries to protect against SQL injection. I also implemented basic authentication to keep my notes private.
Now, the setup is far from perfect. There’s still a ton of stuff I want to add.
- Like support for image uploads, better search, and maybe even a WYSIWYG editor.
- But for now, it works.
- It’s a simple, fast, and reliable way for me to manage my notes and ideas.
Finally, I deployed it on a cheap VPS. I used Docker to containerize the application and Nginx as a reverse proxy. That way, I can easily update the application without taking down the whole server.
So that’s my rory setup in a nutshell. It’s been a fun and challenging project, and I’ve learned a lot along the way. I will keep improving it.
