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I like the Sticky Notes very much, they are always on the desktop.

But I can't find it in Ubuntu since 12.04. Other programs like gnotes & Xjournal are not giving a feature to stay on the desktop.

So, is there any application similar to the old sticky notes in Ubuntu?

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13 Answers 13

217
  1. Good news: you can have Sticky Notes in Ubuntu.

    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:umang/indicator-stickynotes
    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get install indicator-stickynotes
    
  2. If you'd also like to try an alternative, I can suggest XPad as well, which should be in the official repositories.

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  • 5
    Thank you !! Xpad works exactly what I was looking for .good application. Feb 12, 2017 at 18:41
  • 4
    As a note for people coming in the future (speaking as someone who's used both of these) - stickynotes seems to have an issue where it keeps launching duplicate instances of itself and pollutes my system tray (among other annoyances) - xpad seems to just "work better".
    – Krease
    Jan 25, 2018 at 23:19
  • Yep, sticky notes doesn't work with alt+tab. The moment you click on different window, it disappears. IMO, DO NOT INSTALL. Just 2 min ago installed xpad, works with Alt+Tab, allows visibility in all workspaces, maximizes, etc. Simple, works. Aug 23, 2018 at 16:07
  • i second what people are saying. Do not install Sticky Notes. It's horrible. The default color is horrendous and there are no options. xpad works.
    – cbloss793
    Dec 14, 2018 at 17:09
  • I cannot even get Sticky Notes to work (on Ubuntu 22.04). Clicking the icon and selecting "New Note" doesn't seem to do anything. I'll join the other commenters in recommending against installing this one. Xpad is not perfect, but did work out of the box for me.
    – waldyrious
    Nov 15, 2023 at 12:28
134

xpad deserves a try. Type in terminal:

sudo apt-get install xpad

xpad

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  • 4
    Xpad is currently maintained. Feb 12, 2014 at 0:12
  • @ArthurBorsboom OP may have been mistaken between xpad which is in the repos and the one for Apple's MacOS. The latter is in fact no longer supported: getxpad.com but just to point out that it seems to be a completely different software.
    – Dan
    Oct 28, 2015 at 13:06
  • 5
    Where it is stored? Jan 27, 2016 at 5:11
  • It worked great in the past, but in a few recent years it became riddled with bugs (e.g. it doesn't remember last open notes and opens them all every time it's launched, it also crashes when I close the last note (or use "close all")). @PratikButani the notes are stored in ~/.config/xpad
    – jena
    Jan 8, 2017 at 11:30
  • 13
    To move the xpad, press ctrl and then move.
    – Foreever
    Sep 6, 2019 at 18:00
13

Tomboy

This is a note taking app for your Linux which also works on Mac and Windows platforms.

Features:

  • Making notes
  • highlight text
  • bulleting
  • change fonts
  • link to email addresses

... and much more.

To install:

sudo apt-get install tomboy

enter image description here

official site

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  • 6
    this is not sticky...
    – insign
    Oct 23, 2015 at 21:13
  • 4
    this looks ugly and as @insign mentioned, it's not sticky
    – Kuber
    Feb 13, 2016 at 9:52
  • 1
    Just tried it, and it supports Latex !! To me, that eliminates all other choices :) Sep 29, 2017 at 5:13
  • Ugly yes, but the one I was able to install at work where I can't change the repositories. So thank you.
    – nessa.gp
    Oct 19, 2017 at 15:50
5

My preferred one is xfce4-notes. To install:

sudo apt-get install xfce4-notes*
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  • 3
    sadly I couldn't make this work outside Xfce (e.g. in Unity or elementaryOS) - it won't show an icon anywhere unless you use xfce4-panel
    – jena
    Jan 8, 2017 at 11:27
5

Try the following command. For me it worked on a Ubuntu 18.04 LTS.

sudo snap install stickynotes

Screenshot of stickynotes

These are even better than the Windows stickynotes. You can arrange multiple notes as tiles and them access them individually as needed. You can color code them based on priority or just to identify them distinctly. They also have multiple options like:

  • Adding video
  • Adding audio
  • Touch mode
  • Import
  • Export
  • Spelling suggestions as you write
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  • @Kevin How did you add inline image? I was not able to find a way to do that.
    – nd23
    Nov 22, 2019 at 20:02
  • I just added an exlamation mark. You can click on he edited link to see revisions Nov 22, 2019 at 23:02
  • 1
    I can't add text to the sticky. This is pretty bad
    – Heisenberg
    Jul 23, 2020 at 4:17
  • 2
    @Heisenberg I usually avoid snap packages. The majority of snap packages that I install on my computer don't work.
    – chx101
    Apr 9, 2021 at 8:35
3

A mac like notes app. http://www.get-notes.com/

Comes with great features.

  • Cross platform
  • Auto save
  • Search
1
  • just what I was looking for. Perfect. thank you Oct 4, 2021 at 19:50
3

I have found my self three more good tools and I would like add them here , may be that can help others in future .

knotes:

sudo apt-get install knotes

note(CLI):

sudo apt-get install note

knotes-mobile:

  sudo apt-get install knotes-mobile
2

Not really a Ubuntu thing, but have found the Sticky Notes Chrome app really useful, specially because I have different workplaces and they sync through Google drive. It also offers formatting options, which lacks in some Linux options. Here's the link: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/sticky-notes/nbjdhgkkhefpifbifjiflpaajchdkhpg/related?hl=en

1
  • 1
    Beware - I lost all my notes with this app! One day they disappeared and I never got them back :( I still have xml files in my drive but the app does not see them so I'm screwed. OT: does anyone know of a good xml parser to extract my notes from this pickle?
    – jena
    Jan 8, 2017 at 11:23
1

For really quick notes, on Ubuntu Budgie we have QuickNote, an area to drop quick & short notes:

enter image description here

  • Customizable size
  • Customizable data location can be
1

Thought I'd throw my programme in for good measure: Gnut

Screenshot of Gnut

I got a bit fed up with xnote and wrote a JavaFX-based sticky notes programme called Gnut some years back. It's pretty basic but has served my colleagues and I well. I've just added copy paste and put a more easy-to-install release up on GitLab

0

I use conky with /etc/conky/conky.conf containing:

${exec head -n 16 /home/aaa/myfiles/todo/todo.txt | fold -w 50 -s}

source: 'conky' in http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/linux-and-open-source/make-your-linux-desktop-send-alerts-that-you-cant-miss/ from google 'linux wallpaper reminder'

add command conky -d -p 10 to 'session and startup' so conky start automatically during startup.

source: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=140105 from google 'xfce conky not showing' result 1

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  • Send a sample of the todo.txt contents. Jun 7, 2020 at 5:03
0

I know it's an old question, but there's another software available in the current Ubuntu Software app (I'm on 18.04), that is also called Sticky Notes, but I don't think it is in anyway related to the other app suggested above.

The notes for it says the project page and GitHub page are at:

It works well for me. Sometimes a little sluggish, but it does a good job of what I need it to. I also evaluated xpad, but this works for me. It looks you can sync it to DropBox, but I haven't needed to do that myself.

0

I will suggest you SimpleNote.This application that works across different platforms and mobile devices, then you should take a look at Simplenote. Your notes stay updated across all your devices and stay organized so you can find notes quickly with instant searching and simple tags.

https://simplenote.com/

enter image description here

Imagesource: https://simplenote.com/2017/11/20/windows-and-linux-app-update-now-available-2/

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  • web based. I prefer google's Keep. Aug 1, 2023 at 2:54
  • Back there, I used Simple Note. However, I prefer Google Keep and Microsoft OneNote. Nov 25, 2023 at 19:01

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