Zim

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What is Zim?

Zim [zim-wiki.org] is a free note-taking application available for Windows, macOS, and Linux. It lets you create and open "wiki" style folders in your PC that store rich text notes in a tree structure, meaning that a note can be a child of another note. It's also called "Zim Desktop Wiki."

A window titled "My Notes:Cool Websites - Notes." The menubar has the options: File, Edit, View, Insert, Format, Search, Tools, Go, Help. Under the toolbar, the left side pane labelled "Index" displays a tree hierarchy. The root node is "My Notes." Under it, Cool Websites (active) and Reminders. The main pane shows a text with a heading "Cool Websites." Written underneath as normal text the date when it was created, and the text "www.virtualcuriosities.com is a cool website."
A screenshot of Zim Desktop Wiki.

Observation: the first time you run Zim it will ask you to "add a notebook." A notebook in Zim is a folder where the notes will be stored. This is just like choosing where to save a file, except it will save the notes as a whole folder full of subfolders inside.

A dialog window titled "Add Notebook." It reads: please select a name and a folder for the notebook. Name (text field, value: Notes). Folder (text field, value: ~/Notebooks/Notes). A browse button. To create a new notebook you need to select an empty folder. Of course you can also select an existing zim notebook folder. Two buttons: Cancel and OK.
The "Add Notebook" dialog of Zim.

Observation: in Zim, it's possible to embed images and resize them. Embedding is done by copying the image into the notebook's folder, and resizing is a destructive operation, meaning if you resize an image you can't just resize it back to its original size later to get the original image because the pixels will have been modified.

Questions and Answers

Is Zim Open Source?

Yes, Zim is open source licensed under GPL v2. Its repository is found at https://github.com/zim-desktop-wiki/zim-desktop-wiki.

Written by Noel Santos.

About the Author

I'm a self-taught Brazilian programmer graduated in IT from a FATEC. In a world of increasingly complex and essential computers, I decided to use my technical expertise in hardware, desktop applications, and web technologies to create an informative resource to make PC's easier to understand.

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