nota

A fast, terminal-native note-taking tool. Notes are plain .md and .txt files stored in a folder on your PC — no accounts, no sync services, no lock-in.

Works alongside Obsidian, VS Code, or any editor. Everything is just files.

Install

Requirements: Node.js 16 or higher

npm install -g notavault

After install, the nota command is available anywhere in your terminal.

Quick Start

# Set where your notes will live
nota vault "C:\Users\you\Documents\notes"

# Create your first note
nota new "my first note"

# Open today's journal
nota today

# Capture a thought instantly
nota "just had an idea about the landing page"

All Commands

Notes

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota new <name> | Create a new note | | nota new <name> -f <folder> | Create a note inside a folder | | nota edit <name> | Open a note in your editor | | nota read <name> | Read a note rendered in the terminal | | nota delete <name> | Delete a note (asks for confirmation) | | nota rename <old> <new> | Rename a note and update all links automatically | | nota open <name> | Print the file path (useful for piping to other tools) |

Browsing & Search

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota list | List all notes | | nota list -l | List with size, date, and link count | | nota list -f <folder> | List notes in a specific folder | | nota find <query> | Search inside all notes | | nota find <query> --fuzzy | Search by note name with fuzzy matching |

Capture & Inbox

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota "your thought" | Instantly capture a thought to inbox | | nota capture "thought" | Same as above | | nota capture "thought" --tag work | Capture with a tag | | nota inbox | Open inbox to review and process captures | | nota inbox --read | Preview inbox entries in the terminal |

Daily Notes & Tasks

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota today | Open or create today's daily note | | nota tasks | Show all open tasks across all notes | | nota tasks -a | Show completed tasks too | | nota tasks -f <folder> | Show tasks in a specific folder only |

Knowledge Graph

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota links <name> | Show what a note links to and what links back to it | | nota orphan | Find notes with no links in or out | | nota orphan --incoming | Find notes nothing links to | | nota orphan --outgoing | Find notes that link to nothing | | nota random | Open a random note (weighted toward older notes) | | nota random --orphan | Random note from orphans only | | nota random --folder <folder> | Random note from a specific folder | | nota random --tag <tag> | Random note with a specific tag |

Review

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota review | Weekly reflection on your vault | | nota review weekly | Same as above | | nota review monthly | Monthly reflection | | nota review <project> | Review scoped to a specific project |

Organisation

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota folder | List all folders | | nota folder <name> | Create a new folder | | nota move <note> <folder> | Move a note into a folder |

Vault & Settings

| Command | Description | |---|---| | nota vault | Show current vault location | | nota vault <path> | Change vault location | | nota stats | Show vault statistics | | nota ui | Open the interactive menu |

Features

Plain files, always

Every note is a .md or .txt file in a regular folder on your PC. Open your vault in VS Code, Obsidian, or File Explorer — everything works. No proprietary format, no database.

Wiki-links

Connect notes by writing [[note-name]] inside any note. nota tracks every link automatically.

# Meeting Notes

Following up on [[project-roadmap]] and [[team-decisions]].

• nota links <name> shows inbound and outbound links for any note
• nota orphan finds notes that have fallen out of your knowledge graph
• Renaming a note with nota rename updates every [[link]] that points to it

Instant capture

The fastest way to capture a thought — just type it directly after nota:

nota "revisit the pricing page copy"
nota "call supplier about delivery times"
nota "idea: add dark mode to the dashboard"

All captures go to inbox/inbox.md with a timestamp. Process them later with nota inbox.

Daily notes

nota today creates a dated note in your daily/ folder with a ready-made template:

# 2026-05-17

## Tasks
- [ ]

## Notes

## End of day

Review

nota review generates a reflective summary of your vault — not a dry analytics report, but a thinking tool. It surfaces recently created notes, unfinished tasks, your most connected ideas, forgotten orphan notes, and randomly resurfaces old ideas you may have lost track of. It ends with a reflection prompt to help you think.

nota review              # weekly (default)
nota review monthly
nota review project-x    # scoped to a project

Fuzzy search

nota find "stndp" --fuzzy    # matches "standup"
nota find "prjct" --fuzzy    # matches "project-ideas"

VS Code / editor integration

# Open a note directly in VS Code
code $(nota open "my note")

# Open your entire vault as a workspace
code ~/nota-vault

Set your preferred editor so nota edit opens it automatically:

# PowerShell — add to your $PROFILE to make it permanent
$env:EDITOR = "code"          # VS Code
$env:EDITOR = "antigravity"   # Antigravity
$env:EDITOR = "notepad"       # Notepad (default on Windows)

Vault Structure

nota organises your vault like this:

nota-vault/
├── daily/              ← daily notes (created by nota today)
│   ├── 2026-05-15.md
│   └── 2026-05-16.md
├── inbox/              ← quick captures (created by nota capture)
│   └── inbox.md
├── work/               ← your own folders
│   ├── standup.md
│   └── project-plan.md
└── ideas.md            ← notes in vault root

Folders are just regular filesystem folders. Create them with nota folder <name> or directly in your file explorer.

Tips

# Process your inbox every morning
nota inbox

# Find notes you haven't touched in a while
nota random

# Find disconnected notes and link them up
nota orphan

# Scope your task view to one project
nota tasks -f work

# Move old notes to an archive folder
nota folder archive
nota move "old-project" archive

# Use nota inside a git repo — notes are just files
nota vault ./docs
git add docs/ && git commit -m "update notes"

Uninstall

npm uninstall -g notavault

Your notes are untouched — they are just files in your vault folder. Uninstalling nota does not delete anything.

License

MIT — free to use, modify, and distribute.