note

A minimalist command-line note-taking tool written in Go. Take notes in your favorite editor with automatic date stamping, simple organization, and zero lock-in—just plain markdown files.

Features

• Automatic Date Stamping: Notes get -YYYYMMDD appended to filenames
• Tab Completion: Bash, Zsh, and Fish support
• Archive System: Notes are never deleted, just archived
• Full-Text Search: Search note contents with -s
• Flag Chaining: Combine flags like -al or -as
• Shell Aliases: Optional shortcuts (n, nls, nrm)
• Zero Dependencies: Single static binary, no external libraries

Quick Start

First run prompts for configuration:

$ note
What is your preferred text editor (vim): nvim
What directory are you saving notes in (~/Notes): ~/Dropbox/Notes

Reconfigure anytime with note --config. Settings stored in ~/.note.

Usage

Create or Open a Note

note MyIdea                    # Creates MyIdea-20260128.md
note MyIdea-20260128.md        # Opens existing note
note My<TAB>                   # Tab completion finds matching notes

List Notes

note -l                        # List all notes
note -l project                # Filter by pattern (case-insensitive)
note -al project               # Include archived notes

Search Note Contents

note -s "important"            # Search text within notes
note -as "important"           # Search including archived

Archive Notes

note -d OldNote                # Archive a note (moves to Archive/)
note -d Old*                   # Archive with wildcards

Shell Aliases

note --alias                   # Install n, nls, nrm aliases

Help

note -h                        # Quick help
note --help                    # Detailed help
note --version                 # Version info

Installation

From Binary

# Download from https://github.com/brockers/note/releases
chmod +x note
sudo mv note /usr/local/bin/

From Source

git clone https://github.com/brockers/note.git
cd note
make build
make install    # or: cp note ~/bin/

Enable Tab Completion

note --autocomplete            # Auto-detects and configures your shell

Development

make build      # Build binary
make test       # Run all 211 tests
make fmt        # Format code

Philosophy

• Just markdown files in folders.
• No databases, no sync, no lock-in.
• Use git, Dropbox, or any tool you prefer to sync.
• Follows Unix philosophy: do one thing well.

License

GPL-3.0 — See LICENSE for details.

Links

• Repository
• Releases
• Issues
• Release Notes