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Add to SafariWhen comparing hackmd.io vs Quip, the Slant community recommends Quip for most people. In the question“What are the best cross-platform collaborative writing apps?” Quip is ranked 2nd while hackmd.io is ranked 3rd. The most important reason people chose Quip is:
Quip allows for offline editing of documents which then sync upon connection to Wi-Fi. This way users can continuing working while not connected to a data signal, but they can still back up their work when they do finally get one.
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Collaborative
Allows multiple people to edit the same note in realtime.
Pro Automatic "table of content"
Automatically generates a "table of content" of your headlines.
Pro Supports revisions
Allows you to go back in time to a previous version of your document.
Pro Edit and view-only permission settings
Note: Enterprise Edition has even more refined permissions, but the permissions in the non-enterprise edition are pretty powerful.
Pro Shortcuts from Sublime Text, Emacs, and Vim
Pro Tag support
This is truly helpful for organizing your documents.
Pro Can create slide-shows
Supports creating slide-shows in markdown.
Pro Online
It's multi-platform (works well on smartphones) and there is no need to install anything.
Pro Math support
Use LaTeX seamlessly within the editor.
Pro Dark and white theme
Perfect for working at night.
Pro Lightweight
Pro Book mode view
This is really helpful for longer documents. Or even "books." This is also super helpful for journaling activities and the like.
Pro Available as a web service
HackMD service can be downloaded and installed in custom servers.
Pro Cross platform
Is available as desktop app.
Pro Dropbox import and export
Pro Extended markdown syntax
Adds supports for embeddings from Youtube, Vimeo, Speakerdeck, GitHub gist etc; and even creating UML diagrams, Graphviz graphs, Timing charts, and even Music notes! and alerts and comments boxes and emojis.
Pro Open source
HackMD Core's source is available on GitHub.
Pro Free
You can subscribe to it for more features.
Pro Github Gist import and export
People who subscribe can push and pull unlimited.
Pro Google Drive import and export
Pro Offline editing
Quip allows for offline editing of documents which then sync upon connection to Wi-Fi. This way users can continuing working while not connected to a data signal, but they can still back up their work when they do finally get one.
Pro Amazing mobile interface
Unlike other mobile apps, Quip has really innovated the text editor on mobile, making for a good Evernote alternative. It has a great interface for formatting text that stays out of your road so to maximize how much room you have to type.
Pro Private document sharing
Files can be shared with others via a URL. The owner of the shared document can set it to be in read-only mode or they can allow anyone to edit it. Collaborators don't need to have a Quip account to participate. This feature makes for a great Evernote alternative, for those looking for a different app that has this similar function.
Pro Highly compatible
Quip can export documents to several formats, including .DOC, .PDF, .HTML, as well as a couple of others. This allows for compatibility with a wide selection of other apps.
Cons
Con Custom grammar and spell checker
It does not work well in French (and probably other languages).
Con Not as beautiful as StackEdit
Con Cannot organize notes
Doesn't have the ability to organize notes or create notebooks.
Con Slow servers / problem with online / offline switching
Servers can be slow / down for a few seconds preventing from working on the documents currently being edited.
Con No PDF export support
Con Tries to be smart
It guesses what you want to do and tries to help, often in a wrong and annoying way, for example it when working with list items. Ironically Markdown was built to solve those problems (you format yourself with simple codes and it just works).
Con New version has performance issues
…on my old phone. Yes I know my phone is at fault but the old version wasn't annoyingly slow in the Spreadsheet component.
Con Not really free with stringent controls on trial
The trial is content limited which means if you start using it quite a bit they'll pick the perfect moment to swoop in and start charging you. It's better for them because it means they can look at your account and pick the best time to ask you to pay (hey we notice you're using Quip lots and have a new project you just started how about you pay now or you lose everything).
Con Limited formatting on spreadsheets
Within spreadsheet cells, you can't do things like, for example, taking part of the text and aligning it to the center or to the left. Furthermore, in the mobile app, you can't jump to the next line to keep writing inside the same cell.
Con Can't rename files
You can't really rename documents per se in Quip. What you do is put the first line of the document as its title, so that it is displayed on the main list of documents on the app. The program suggests to combine it with a HL (Large Heading) format.
