Luminotes.com will shut down on March 1st. Read more.
Bad news: Luminotes is shutting down

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Bad news: Luminotes is shutting down

The Bad News

Luminotes.com will shut down on March 1, 2010. At that time, you will no longer be able to view or edit any notes hosted at Luminotes.com, and no further releases nor support for any Luminotes products will be available.

I originally launched Luminotes in 2007, working on it as a full-time startup. During 2009, when it became clear that Luminotes was not taking off quite as I had hoped, I gradually transitioned to other projects, hoping to continue working on Luminotes as time allowed and later making it available as a free service. Over the past few months, my Luminotes releases have grown more infrequent, and what little time I have spent on Luminotes has been allotted to Luminotes maintenance and support. Eventually it became clear that despite my best intentions, I'm not able to devote the time to Luminotes that the project deserves. As a result, I've decided to shut down the Luminotes.com service and officially discontinue my own development of all Luminotes products.

The Good News

Luminotes is still open source software, just like it's been since the beginning. This means that any software developer with the interest and the skills is able to take the source code and continue developing the project on their own. So if someone steps up to take over that responsibility, Luminotes may still live on in some form. The other good news is you still have a few weeks to migrate your notes to other note taking or wiki software. I know that a number of you rely on Luminotes.com, and I want to give you sufficient time to get your data exported. You can export all of your notebook data from Luminotes into HTML or CSV format. Note that if you'd like to download any file attachments or images, you'll have to download those manually. 

Q & A

Q. How will this affect my copy of Luminotes Desktop? A. It won't. Luminotes Desktop will continue to function just fine without Luminotes.com. However, I won't be releasing any new versions nor providing support for Luminotes Desktop.

Q. How will this affect my own installation of Luminotes Server? A. It won't. Any copies of Luminotes Server you installed on your own server will continue to function without Luminotes.com. However, I won't be releasing any new versions nor providing support for Luminotes Server. Q. Can't you charge money or accept donations to keep development going? A. It's not about the money.. It's about time. I've got a full-time job now, and unfortunately that leaves me precious little time and energy to work on Luminotes during nights and weekends. Q. What personal wiki or note taking software do you recommend switching to? A. There are a number of other applications out there, some web-based and some desktop-based. You might want to check out http://wikimatrix.org/ for software comparisons. I'm actually a Luminotes user myself, and I haven't yet decided what software I'll switch to for my own note taking and personal wiki needs. Q. I'd like to take over some or all Luminotes development. Who do I contact? A. Me. Q. What happens if I don't get my notes out of Luminotes.com before March 1st? Will they be lost? A. Yes, so I recommend you export all of your notebooks before then. I will emphasize that this only applies to online notes at Luminotes.com. You can continue to use Luminotes Desktop or your own installation of Luminotes Server as long as you like.

And Finally

I'd like to thank all Luminotes users, past and present, for your support and enthusiasm. Luminotes got as far as it did because of your great ideas and feedback.

Dan

Thank you, Dan, for making a great product and good luck with your work. I will keep on using Luminotes - its perfect for me. --Jonathan

​Thank you, Dan.  I love Luminotes and will keep on using it! Many blessings to you in your new adventures.  Judy

​Thank you, Dan.  I found Luminotes in December 2009 and immediately fell in love with your note taking application.  Good news, I just started.  Bad news, I just started.  I will try to use the Luminotes Desktop in tandem with Evernotes. Let us know what software you decide to use for yourself.  Best wishes and much satisfaction and success to you in your future endeavors. Again thank you, Luminotes gave me a great lift in productivity.  George

​Thanks Dan. Luminotes has been great for keeping track of and updating my notes online between work and home. It's sad to see the online function shutting down as I don't know how I survived without it in the first place. Will definitely start using desktop though. Thanks again and best of luck. Alex.

What a pitty that one of the few online apps which I really use will shut down...
Dan, thanks for the good work!

- Jens

​Dan, thanks a lot for all the time and effort you put into Luminotes. Just started using it but I really like the product, so too bad that you cannot continue with it. I wish you luck with your new activities. Thanks again and regards, Robert-Jan (Netherlands)

​I'll add to the "Awww shucks" sentiment. Luminotes is a wonderfully clean and straight-forward app. If only it was PHP, I might consider stepping up to keep it alive. Best of luck with future projects!

​Noooo! Don't let us down :)

Well, that's life, we understand. Luminotes was simple and was working just fine. Sad.
When I try to export my notebooks (html or cvs) I can export only ONE notebook at a time. Is there a way to export them all?

​Exporting multiple notebooks

If it would really be a huge pain to individually export your notebooks, then please contact me at the support email address, and I'll see what I can do.

Dan

P.S. Thanks to everyone for the kind words.

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