Joplin Notes: Open Source Notes Without Lock-In [YouTube Release]

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1

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Joplin is an open-source, local-first note-taking app that gives you control over your data, your sync, and your workflow.

In this video, I walk through Joplin’s core features, including sync and hosting options, self-hosting the Joplin Server, sharing, plugins, and how Joplin supports both Markdown and WYSIWYG editing. I also cover why Joplin works well for practical note organization without locking you into a SaaS platform.

Links Mentioned for Note Taking Methods

Second Brank Para

Zettelkasten

Memex Method

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Chapters
00:00 Joplin App
01:53 Joplin Hosting Options
03:06 Synchronisation
03:40 Joplin Docker Self Hosted Server
05:52 Editing Notes In Joplin
07:45 External Editors
08:51 Sharing Notes as Web Page
10:10 Note History
11:02 ToDos and Alarms
12:08 Shared Notebook Between Users
13:11 Sync Conflicts
13:35 Plugins
15:05 Mobile App
16:09 Joplin Browser Web Clipper
17:29 Other Open Source Apps
17:41 Logseq
18:19 Appflowy
18:52 Trilium Notes
19:31 Note Taking Methodologies

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2

Anyone got SSO working with Joplin Server? I can’t get SAML working. I keep running into an error when I click on the SSO button “Cannot read properties of null (reading ‘replace’)”

Joplin Server v3.5.2 with authentik 2025.12.3

added these to compose
SAML_ENABLED=true
SAML_IDP_CONFIG_FILE=/saml/joplin-idp.xml
SAML_SP_CONFIG_FILE=/saml/joplin-sp.xml
APP_BASE_URL=https://your-joplin-url.com
API_BASE_URL=https://your-joplin-url.com

replaces with the appropriate substituions

Looking through the logs for SAML entries (not sure what might be useful):
06:37:42 1|app | 2026-02-08 06:37:42: [error] App: 192.168.0.195: TypeError: Cannot read properties of null (reading ‘replace’) 06:37:42 1|app | at Object.util.decode64 (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/node-forge/lib/util.js:1621:17)
06:37:42 1|app | at Object.getPublicKeyPemFromCertificate (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/samlify/src/utility.ts:176:29)
06:37:42 1|app | at Object.getKey (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/samlify/src/libsaml.ts:635:26)
06:37:42 1|app | at Object.constructSAMLSignature (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/samlify/src/libsaml.ts:349:70)
06:37:42 1|app | at Object.base64LoginRequest (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/samlify/src/binding-post.ts:51:26)
06:37:42 1|app | at ServiceProvider.createLoginRequest (/home/joplin/packages/server/node_modules/samlify/src/entity-sp.ts:74:31)
06:37:42 1|app | at getLoginRequest (/home/joplin/packages/server/src/utils/saml.ts:43:12)
06:37:42 1|app | at generateRedirectHtml (/home/joplin/packages/server/src/utils/saml.ts:48:23)
06:37:42 1|app | at Object.handler (/home/joplin/packages/server/src/routes/index/login.ts:48:10)
06:37:42 1|app | at execRequest (/home/joplin/packages/server/src/utils/routeUtils.ts:236:13)

Been at it for days.

3

I have never tried to set it up with authentication, if no one here has any suggestions you might want to try their forums https://discourse.joplinapp.org/

4

I’ll give that a try. Reading posts on this forum and watching your video is what gave me the courage and guidance to start homelabing. Thank you so much for all the extra effort you do to share you knowledge and love for tech. I’m sure there are many with the same interest but they don’t take the effort to share.

5

Spent another couple hours with my frienemies Claude and Gemini… finally got SAML working. Summaried what I learned (tripping hazards) here: [Joplin Serve] Support SAML SLS/SLO - #13 by HomeAdmin - Features - Joplin Forum

These instructions ( Joplin Server SAML support | Joplin ) are insufficient for a newboe like me… hope my notes can save others hours/days of frustration. But it was likely a me problem.

1 Like