A local-first, AI-enhanced note-taking desktop app designed for zero-friction capture. Input anything into a stream of atomic Markdown files while background AI agents automatically organize your content by generating tags, computing semantic embeddings, and surfacing relationships between your notes.
Website: notetaiker.a-bba.dev
Download the latest release for your platform from the website or install via the command line.
macOS / Linux
curl -fsSL https://notetaiker.a-bba.dev/install | bashWindows (PowerShell)
powershell -c "irm notetaiker.a-bba.dev/install.ps1 | iex"You can also grab builds directly from GitHub Releases.
| OS | Architecture |
|---|---|
| Windows | x64 (Intel/AMD) |
| macOS | ARM64 (Apple Silicon) |
| Linux | x64, ARM64 |
- Multi-core CPU (Intel/AMD x64 or ARM64)
- 4 GB RAM minimum
- 500 MB disk space for app + models
- Zero-Friction Capture: Open the app and start typing immediately. Press
Cmd+Enter(orCtrl+Enter) to save. - Auto-Save: Notes are saved automatically as you type with a debounced 1-second delay.
- Draft Persistence: Unsaved work survives app restarts — drafts are preserved in local storage and restored on relaunch.
- Local-First: All data is stored as plain Markdown files on your disk. You own your data.
- AI-Powered Organization: Background agents analyze your notes and generate tags automatically. Dismiss or keep AI suggestions.
- Ollama Integration: Auto-start Ollama, download and manage models directly from the app with dedicated text, embedding, and image model slots.
- Semantic Search & Related Notes: Vector embeddings power similarity-based discovery so you can find notes related to what you're reading.
- Graph Visualization: Explore your notes as an interactive force-directed graph with tag-based links, semantic clustering (DBSCAN), filtering, and local-view navigation.
- Markdown Preview: Toggle between edit and rendered preview modes in the editor.
- Multi-Model Support: Configure OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, or local Ollama models for AI processing.
- Atomic Notes: Each note is a separate Markdown file with YAML frontmatter for metadata.
- Navigation Guard: The app warns you before navigating away from unsaved changes, with options to save, discard, or cancel.
- Collapsible Sidebar: Toggle the sidebar with
Cmd+B. Responsive layout adapts to mobile screens. - Power User Friendly: Keyboard shortcuts, a command palette (
Cmd+K), hashtag autocomplete, and a Markdown editor built on CodeMirror 6. - Real-Time Feedback: Server-Sent Events keep the UI in sync with background processing status.
- Open the app — the editor is immediately focused.
- Type your note in Markdown.
- Press
Cmd+Enter(orCtrl+Enter) to save. - Use
#hashtagsinline to add manual tags.
- Press
Cmd+Kto open the Command Palette. - Search by text content or tags.
- Use arrow keys to navigate results and
Enterto open a note. - Browse the Timeline sidebar for chronological history with infinite scroll.
- View Related Notes in the sidebar for semantically similar content.
- Switch to the Graph View to see all notes and tags as an interactive force-directed graph.
- Filter by tags using the toolbar (AND/OR modes).
- Local View: Alt+click a node to focus on its immediate neighborhood.
- Semantic Clustering: Toggle cluster coloring to see groups of related notes detected by DBSCAN.
- High Contrast: Toggle a high-contrast color palette for accessibility (persisted across sessions).
- Double-click a node to navigate to that note.
- Go to Settings (via the command palette or navigation).
- Enter your API key for your preferred provider (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, or use Ollama for local models).
- The system validates the key and enables background processing.
- Monitor and retry failed jobs from the Settings page.
- Navigate to Settings > Models.
- Browse the model catalog and download models for text, embedding, or image slots.
- Activate, switch, or delete models from within the app.
- Ollama is auto-started when needed and shut down on app exit.
- Navigate to Settings > Smart Connections.
- View indexing status (indexed notes vs total).
- Trigger a full Rebuild if needed.
notetAIker is a Bun monorepo.
notetaiker/
├── apps/
│ ├── desktop/ # Main application (Electrobun desktop, Hono API, React frontend)
│ ├── cli/ # CLI tool
│ └── website/ # Marketing/landing site
├── packages/
│ ├── env/ # Shared environment config (Zod-validated)
│ ├── eslint-config/# Shared ESLint configuration
│ └── tsconfig/ # Shared TypeScript configuration
├── data/notes/ # Note storage (Markdown files)
└── .notetaiker/ # SQLite databases and secrets
- Framework: React 19 + Vite
- Styling: Tailwind CSS v4
- State: TanStack Query v5
- Editor: CodeMirror 6 with markdown extensions, hashtag autocomplete, and link handling
- Graph:
react-force-graph-2dwith D3-force physics - Routing: React Router v7
- Search: Command palette powered by
cmdk - Icons: Lucide React
- Forms: React Hook Form
- Server: Hono (running on Bun)
- Database: SQLite via
bun:sqlite+sqlite-vec(for indexing and job queues, not note storage) - AI Integration: Vercel AI SDK with providers for OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, and Ollama
- Async Processing:
p-queueandp-retryfor background jobs with concurrency control - Validation: Zod schemas for all request/response data
- Notes: Atomic Markdown files with YAML frontmatter (
id,title,tags,ai_tags,ignored_tags,createdAt,updatedAt). - Index: SQLite database for fast full-text search and metadata queries.
- Embeddings: 768-dimension vectors stored in
sqlite-vecvirtual tables for semantic similarity. - Jobs: SQLite-backed queue with
analysis(AI tagging) andembeddingsjob types.
| Method | Path | Description |
|---|---|---|
GET |
/notes |
List notes (paginated) |
POST |
/notes |
Create a new note |
GET |
/notes/:id |
Get a note by ID |
PATCH |
/notes/:id |
Update note metadata |
GET |
/notes/:id/related |
Get semantically related notes |
GET |
/settings |
Get current settings |
POST |
/settings |
Save settings |
POST |
/settings/validate |
Validate an API key |
GET |
/settings/failed-jobs |
Get failed job count |
POST |
/settings/retry-jobs |
Retry failed jobs |
GET |
/embeddings/status |
Get embedding index status |
POST |
/embeddings/rebuild |
Rebuild embedding index |
GET |
/api/clusters |
Get semantic clusters |
POST |
/api/clusters/rebuild |
Rebuild clusters |
GET |
/api/models/slots |
Get model slot configuration |
GET |
/api/models/catalog |
Get available model catalog |
GET |
/api/models/status |
Get model download status |
GET |
/api/models/ollama-status |
Check Ollama availability |
POST |
/api/models/download |
Start model download |
POST |
/api/models/activate |
Activate a model for a slot |
POST |
/api/models/cancel-download |
Cancel model download |
DELETE |
/api/models/:modelId |
Delete a model |
GET |
/api/events |
SSE stream for real-time events |
GET |
/health |
Health check |
- Bun: v1.1 or higher
- Git
-
Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/thinkong/notetaiker.git cd notetaiker -
Install dependencies
bun install
-
Configure Environment
Copy the example environment file:
cp .env.example .env
The default configuration stores notes in
./data/notesrelative to the project root. ModifyNOTES_DIRin.envto change the storage location. -
Start Development Server
This command starts both the API server (port 3001) and the Web client (port 5173):
bun run dev
- Web Interface: http://localhost:5173
- API Server: http://localhost:3001
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
bun run dev |
Start API and Web in development mode |
bun run build |
Build all packages and apps |
bun run lint |
Run ESLint across the monorepo |
bun run lint:fix |
Run ESLint with auto-fix |
bun run format |
Format code with Prettier |
bun run desktop:dev |
Build web then start Electrobun app |
bun run desktop:build |
Build web and Electrobun package |
| Layer | Technologies |
|---|---|
| Frontend | React 19, Vite, Tailwind CSS v4, TanStack Query, CodeMirror 6, React Router v7, react-force-graph-2d |
| Backend | Hono, bun:sqlite, sqlite-vec, Vercel AI SDK, p-queue |
| AI Providers | OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, Ollama |
| Dev Tools | TypeScript, ESLint, Prettier, Vitest, Bun, Husky, Commitlint |
| Desktop | Electrobun |
GNU GPLv3