Saber

English |
čeština |
Deutsch |
中文 (简体中文, 中国) |
中文 (繁體, 台灣)

Saber is the notes app built for handwriting.

It’s designed to be as simple and intuitive as possible, while still delivering unique features that you’ll actually use. Additionally, Saber is available across all your devices, large and small, and syncs between them seamlessly.

Notably, it can invert your notes when you’re in dark mode. This allows you to write with white ink on a black background, which is much easier on the eyes in low-light environments like when the teacher turns off the lights in class.
Images and PDFs are also inverted, so you can still use a digital printout or a textbook without the fuss.

Saber uses a dual-password system to protect your notes from anyone but you, even if they have complete control over the server. You can safely store your notes on the official Saber server, another server, or even host your own!

The app is completely open-source so that anyone can view the source code and see exactly what it’s doing and how it handles your data. Many other note-taking apps are closed-source and proprietary, meaning that their inner workings are a mystery to the public.

As someone who studies maths, highlighting multi-line equations was always a hassle with other apps, where the highlighter would change color when it overlapped with itself. Another problem I had was that in some apps, the highlighter would render on top of the text, fading it out and making it hard to read.
Saber’s highlighter has no such issues. It utilizes canvas compositing to render the highlighter in a way that is consistent with/better than traditional paper, where it handles overlaps and maintains color consistency.

Saber has everything you need to keep your notes organized. Create folders inside folders inside folders to your heart’s content with no limit on the number of nested folders. And even though a note may be buried deep within a nested folder, you can still access it easily with your most recent notes always available on the home screen.

Discover a whole new way to capture and organize your thoughts with Saber. Whether you’re a student, professional, or creative mind, Saber is your trusted companion for digital handwriting. Download now and let your ideas flow freely!

Tap to show/hide screenshots

Features

Please see #1 Saber progress.

Install

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/saber-notes/saber.git

flutter pub get

./patches/remove_proprietary_dependencies.sh
flutter build apk --dart-define=OFFLINE_FONTS_ONLY="true"

Links

• Nextcloud server
• Privacy policy
• License
• Releases

Translating

All translations are crowd-sourced. Saber has so far been translated into:

• English (en)
• Arabic (ar)
• Czech (cs)
• German (de)
• Spanish (es)
• Persian (fa)
• French (fr)
• Hebrew (he)
• Hungarian (hu)
• Italian (it)
• Japanese (ja)
• Brazilian Portuguese (pt_BR)
• Russian (ru)
• Turkish (tr)
• Chinese Simplified (zh_Hans_CN)
• Chinese Traditional (zh_Hant_TW)

I’m experimenting with using
Weblate
to crowd-source translations. More information coming soon.

Extending existing languages

Check _missing_translations.yaml
to see if any translations are missing.

1. Use this link
   to edit _missing_translations.yaml.
2. Update your _missing_translations.yaml file with your translations, e.g. updating German (de)

   de:
     editor:
       newerFileFormat:
         title: Diese Notiz wurde mit einer neueren Version von Saber bearbeitet
         subtitle: Wenn du diese Notiz bearbeitest, können Daten verloren gehen. Möchtest du die Notiz trotzdem öffnen?
         openAnyway: Trotzdem öffnen
         cancel: Abbruch
   # ignore the other languages...
   

3. Open a pull request! I’ll do the rest

Adding a new language

1. Look for your locale code here,
   e.g. hi for Hindi, fr for French, bn for Bengali, ar for Arabic, etc.
2. Use this link
   to create a new file in lib/i18n/community/ called strings_XX.i18n.yaml
   where XX is your locale code.
3. Copy the contents of an existing file like
   lib/i18n/strings.i18n.yaml
   and replace the translations with your own.
   If you don’t know the translation for a string, just delete the line.
4. Open a pull request!

Also see slang’s Getting Started for more information.

Translating app store descriptions

We have 2 formats for app store descriptions:

1. F-Droid/Play Store:

   i. Open metadata/en-US/ and copy the
   full_description.txt
   and
   short_description.txt
   files into the metadata/XX/ folder where XX is your locale code.
   Then translate the contents of the files.

   ii. Changelogs are automatically translated from the English version.
   If you spot a mistake, please edit the translated changelog in
   metadata/XX/changelogs/<version-code>.txt where XX is your locale code.

2. Linux .desktop file:

   i. Open
   flatpak/com.adilhanney.saber.desktop
   and add a line for the Comment key with the following format where XX is your locale code:

   Comment[XX]=Your translation
   

   If you also need to translate the Name key, do the same thing.

3. Flathub (optional):

   i. Since this is slightly more technical, you can skip the Flathub part if you
   want to and I’ll copy the translations from the above section.

   ii. In flatpak/com.adilhanney.saber.metainfo.xml
   before the </description> closing tag, add a line for your translation
   with the following format where XX is your locale code:

   <p xml:lang="XX">Your translation</p>
   

   iii. In the same file, you can translate the changelogs by doing the same
   thing in the <release> tags before their </description> closing tag.

Supporting Saber

If you like Saber, please consider supporting it by:

• Spreading the word!
• Starring the project on GitHub
• Sponsoring me on GitHub Sponsors
• Donating via PayPal
• Buying more storage on the Nextcloud server: see Pricing

Development notes