Notely Cloud

Cloud desktop client for the Notely platform. An Electron app that syncs notes, transcriptions, and AI summaries with a self-hosted notely-platform backend.

Prerequisites

• Node.js 20+
• A C++ toolchain (for native addons: better-sqlite3, keytar)
• Platform headers:
  • Ubuntu/Debian: build-essential g++ make python3 python3-dev libsecret-1-dev
  • macOS: Xcode command-line tools
  • Windows: Visual Studio Build Tools with the "Desktop development with C++" workload

Development setup

1. Install dependencies:

   npm install

2. Start the dev app (Vite dev server + Electron):

   npm run dev

Configuration

The app talks to a backend at the URL configured in settings. By default, newly installed instances prompt for a server URL on first run. If you are running your own notely-platform deployment, point the client at that URL.

Development-only environment variables

• DEBUG_DB=true — disables SQLCipher database encryption. Development only. Never set on production builds; the app logs a prominent warning at startup when it is active.
• NOTELY_USER_DATA — override the Electron app.getPath('userData') location (useful for running multiple instances side-by-side during development).

Building a release

The public repo ships a minimal CI workflow (.github/workflows/ci.yml) that runs lint and type-check only. It does not build signed release artifacts.

If you want to produce signed builds of your own, set up a fork and add a workflow that configures the relevant signing credentials (CSC_LINK, CSC_KEY_PASSWORD, APPLE_ID, APPLE_APP_SPECIFIC_PASSWORD, APPLE_TEAM_ID, etc.) as GitHub Actions secrets, and call electron-builder.

Database encryption

The local SQLite database is encrypted with SQLCipher. The encryption key is stored in the OS-native keystore (macOS Keychain, Windows Credential Manager, Linux libsecret).

• Export a recovery key: invoke the IPC security:exportRecoveryKey to receive a 64-char hex key. Back it up securely.
• Import a recovery key: on a fresh install, invoke security:importRecoveryKey with the backed-up hex key before opening encrypted content.

See docs/DATABASE_ENCRYPTION.md for full details.

Related repositories

• notely-platform — backend microservices
• notely-ai — standalone AI desktop client with local transcription/summarization

Security

To report a vulnerability, see SECURITY.md.

License

Apache License 2.0. See LICENSE.