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NotesApp

A cross-platform, offline-first note-taking app with a Notion-style block editor and a local AI assistant — no API keys, no cloud LLM, no per-token cost.

Built with .NET 10 / MAUI (macOS + Windows), an ASP.NET Core API, and Ollama running language models on your own machine.

Features

Notes & organization

  • Rich block editor: headings, bulleted/numbered lists, to-dos, toggles, callouts, quotes, code blocks, tables, dividers, and multi-column layouts
  • Notion-style interactions — / slash menu, a drag-to-reorder block handle with a right-click block menu, Tab/Shift+Tab outline nesting, and a floating toolbar with text colors and highlights
  • Auto-save while you type, undo/redo, folders, tags, favorites, note tabs, and five themes (including Catppuccin)

Offline-first sync

  • Every edit writes to a local SQLite database first, so the app works with no network at all
  • A background sync service pushes and pulls to the API, reconciling with last-write-wins on UpdatedAt

Local AI (via Ollama)

  • Summarize a note, draft a new one from a prompt, rewrite or restructure text, and convert prose into tables
  • Per-block "Ask AI" from the block menu
  • Inline ghost-text autocomplete as you type
  • Related notes through vector embeddings and cosine similarity

Architecture

You type  →  local SQLite (per device)  →  SyncService  →  API  →  SQL Server
                    ↑                                                  │
                    └────────────  pull newer changes back  ───────────┘

AI:  note text  →  API  →  Ollama (local model)  →  result  →  back into the note
Project Role
src/NotesApp.Core Shared models (Note, Folder) + pure text utilities
src/NotesApp.Api ASP.NET Core Minimal API, EF Core → SQL Server, Ollama integration
src/NotesApp.Client .NET MAUI app (MVVM) with local SQLite and a WebView editor
tests/NotesApp.Tests xUnit tests

The rich editor is an HTML/CSS/JS document hosted in a HybridWebView, talking to C# over a JSON message bridge — the native control couldn't provide real block editing.

A full walkthrough lives in docs/ARCHITECTURE.md, including a file-by-file guide and a golden-path trace of a single note.

Tech stack

.NET 10 · MAUI · ASP.NET Core Minimal APIs · EF Core (SQLite + SQL Server) · CommunityToolkit.Mvvm · Docker · Ollama (llama3.2, nomic-embed-text) · xUnit

Getting started

Prerequisites: .NET 10 SDK, the MAUI workload (dotnet workload install maui), Docker, and Ollama.

# 1. Models for the AI features
ollama pull llama3.2
ollama pull nomic-embed-text

# 2. SQL Server for the API
docker run -e "ACCEPT_EULA=Y" -e "MSSQL_SA_PASSWORD=<your-password>" \
  -p 1433:1433 --name notesapp-sql -d mcr.microsoft.com/mssql/server:2022-latest

# 3. Point the API at it (kept out of git via user-secrets)
dotnet user-secrets set "ConnectionStrings:NotesDb" \
  "Server=localhost,1433;Database=NotesApp;User Id=sa;Password=<your-password>;TrustServerCertificate=True" \
  --project src/NotesApp.Api

# 4. Trust the local HTTPS certificate
dotnet dev-certs https --trust

Then run the API and the client in two terminals:

dotnet run --project src/NotesApp.Api --launch-profile https
dotnet build src/NotesApp.Client/NotesApp.Client.csproj -t:Run -f net10.0-maccatalyst

The API applies its database migrations automatically on first run. For Windows, see docs/WINDOWS.md.

dotnet test    # run the test suite

Project status & known limitations

This is a working personal project, developed openly — the trade-offs are deliberate and documented rather than hidden:

  • The API has no authentication. Fine while it binds localhost; it is the required next step before any real deployment.
  • Sync is last-write-wins on whole notes, not per-field merge — enough for one person across devices, not for live collaboration.
  • The AI requires Ollama on the same machine as the API, so AI features stop working if the API is hosted remotely without a model beside it.
  • Note bodies are stored as a single HTML document, not addressable blocks, which is why Notion-style synced blocks and comments aren't feasible yet.

Planned: meeting transcription (Whisper) and Outlook integration via Microsoft Graph.

License

No license has been chosen yet, so all rights are reserved by default.