Noture

A self-hostable note-taking app built on plain markdown files. Inspired by Obsidian's editing experience and Sublime Text's aesthetics, powered by Rust.

Highlights

• Live Preview editor — CodeMirror 6 with inline rendering of markdown, math, diagrams, and images
• Built-in sync — real-time CRDT sync across devices with no third-party service required
• E2E encryption — optional per-vault encryption (XChaCha20-Poly1305) so the server never sees plaintext
• Lightweight desktop app — native app via Tauri (~5 MB, not Electron)
• Self-hosted — run with Docker or a single binary; you own your data
• Plain markdown — flat files on disk, no proprietary format, no vendor lock-in
• Documentation publishing — publish notes or folders as websites under a path or subdomain

Quick Start

# Copy the example config
cp config.example.toml config.toml

# Start with Docker Compose
docker-compose up -d

Open http://localhost:8080 and create your first account.

Installation

Docker Compose

services:
  noture:
    build: .
    ports:
      - '8080:8080'
    volumes:
      - noture-data:/data
      - ./config.toml:/etc/noture/config.toml:ro
    environment:
      NOTURE_CONFIG: /etc/noture/config.toml
      NOTURE_DATA_DIR: /data
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  noture-data:

Minimal config.toml:

bind_addr = "0.0.0.0:8080"
data_dir = "/data"

The first account you create is the admin. Registration then closes; the admin adds further accounts from the admin page.

Single Binary

Download the latest release binary for your platform, then:

export NOTURE_DATA_DIR=/var/lib/noture
export NOTURE_BIND_ADDR=0.0.0.0:8080
./noture-server

Desktop App

Download the Tauri desktop app from the releases page. Available for macOS, Windows, and Linux. The desktop app stores vaults locally and can optionally connect to a self-hosted server for sync.

Configuration

See config.example.toml for the full configuration reference. The server reads NOTURE_CONFIG (default ./config.toml, optional). Every key can be overridden by an environment variable named NOTURE_<KEY>. Unknown keys, invalid values, and an unreadable config file stop the server at startup.

Key	Default	Description
bind_addr	0.0.0.0:8080	Address and port to listen on
data_dir	./data	Directory for databases, attachments, and the search index
secure_cookies	true	Mark session cookies Secure (disable only for plain HTTP)
cors_origins	[]	Origins allowed to make credentialed cross-origin requests
trusted_proxies	[]	Reverse-proxy CIDRs whose X-Forwarded-For is trusted
publish_base_domain	—	Base domain for subdomain-published vaults
public_origin	—	Canonical origin for public links
auth_rate_limit	5	Auth attempts per client IP per minute (0 disables)
password_hash_fast	false	Minimal password-hashing cost, for test environments only

Backups

noture-server backup --data-dir /var/lib/noture --output noture-backup.tar.gz

The archive holds both databases, the attachments and a SHA-256 manifest, and is verified before it is written. It works while the server runs. Add --include-tantivy to keep the search index; otherwise it is rebuilt on start. To restore, stop the server, extract the archive into an empty directory and start the server with data_dir pointing at it.

Features

Editor

• Live Preview markdown (headings, bold, italic, code, links, images)
• WikiLinks with autocomplete and backlink tracking
• Tables, footnotes, strikethrough
• Math rendering via KaTeX (inline and display)
• Mermaid diagrams
• Obsidian-style callouts (14 types)
• Block references and transclusion (![[note]])
• Slash command menu for block insertion

Organization

• Vaults, folders, and tags
• Graph view (D3.js)
• Backlinks panel
• Daily notes and templates
• Starred notes, recent files
• Full-text search

Sync & Collaboration

• Real-time CRDT sync via Yjs/yrs (WebSocket)
• Shared vaults with roles and invitations

Security

• Optional per-vault E2E encryption
• Argon2id password hashing
• API tokens for programmatic access

Publishing

• Publish notes or entire folders as static websites
• Path or subdomain routing (publish_base_domain)

Import & Export

• Import from Obsidian, Joplin, and plain markdown
• Export to HTML, PDF, or ZIP

Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Desktop shell	Tauri v2
Frontend	Svelte 5 + SvelteKit
Editor	CodeMirror 6
Backend	Axum (Rust)
Sync	yrs (Rust Yjs port)
Storage	Flat markdown + SQLite (WAL)
Search	Tantivy
Encryption	XChaCha20-Poly1305 + PBKDF2

Building from Source

Prerequisites: stable Rust (rust-toolchain.toml), Node.js 24 (.node-version), pnpm 11.24.0 (pinned in package.json)

pnpm install

# Web server (produces a single binary with embedded frontend)
pnpm run build:server

# Desktop app
pnpm run tauri build

Development

pnpm run dev          # SvelteKit dev server (port 5173)
pnpm run tauri dev    # Desktop app with hot reload
pnpm run version:bump -- patch   # Bump Noture to the next patch version
pnpm run test         # Rust unit and integration tests
pnpm run test:js      # Editor tests
pnpm --filter @noture/web run test  # Frontend service/store tests
pnpm run test:e2e     # Playwright end-to-end tests
pnpm run lint:all     # Frontend + Rust lint and type checks

License

GNU Affero General Public License v3.0