Core features · Notes · Diagrams

Notes · Diagrams

A floating Post-it you keep next to the terminal. Manage Markdown text notes, free-form drawings, drag-to-draw sequence diagrams and flowcharts (bidirectional Mermaid) as tabs — and in-app AI agents read and write the same notes.

Opening the notes panel

Open it with the Notes icon in the titlebar or Ctrl+Shift+N. The panel can be dragged, resized on all 8 edges, and maximized; right-click a tab for rename · color · pin · delete. Notes are global to the app — one shared set across all Spaces.

Create a new note with the + button in the tab row — a menu asks which kind:

Text notes — Markdown

Write the body in Markdown and toggle between editing and the rendered view with the Preview button. With the panel focused, Ctrl+N creates a new note. Text notes can also be expanded into a main-panel tab for more room.

① Markdown preview. The background follows the window opacity, so the terminal shows through softly.

Drawing notes — free-form

An Excalidraw canvas (fully offline — fonts are bundled with the app). Draw shapes, arrows, freehand strokes and text, toggle the grid, and export to PNG/SVG/PDF or the clipboard.

① A cache → DB sketch. Drawings created by AI are editable here as individual shapes.

Sequence diagrams — drag-to-draw UML

Place objects and actors from the tool palette, then drag between lifelines to create messages. Synchronous calls auto-create activation bars and their replies; wrap ranges in loop/alt/opt/par frames by dragging a box. Participants and messages can be freely repositioned, and labels are edited by double-clicking. Tool shortcuts are shown as badges on each button (H hand, V select, …).

① Activation bars · auto-numbering · notes. ② An alt frame (in stock / out of stock).

Export as Mermaid (.mmd) · SVG · PNG · PDF, or copy the Mermaid — the diagram you drew becomes sequenceDiagram text as-is.

Flowcharts — bidirectional Mermaid

Place nodes with the shape tools (R rectangle · O rounded · S stadium · D diamond · C circle) and drag between nodes with the E edge tool. Dragging a node stores its free position; right-click for shape changes, arrow styles (solid/open/dotted/thick) and delete. The toolbar's right side switches direction (TD/LR/BT/RL), runs auto layout, and toggles the light/dark background.

① A diamond branch with yes/no edge labels. ② What you draw exports as Mermaid flowchart text.

This note kind is bidirectional — drawing on the canvas writes Mermaid flowchart code, and loading Mermaid produced by an AI gives you editable shapes. Hand-placed positions and the background theme aren't part of Mermaid syntax, so they don't appear in the exported text.

AI note sharing

In-app AI agents (claude · codex · gemini) can create, read, update and delete the same notes via the orchterm-notes MCP (on by default — can be disabled in Settings). Ask "summarize this meeting into a note" or "draw this logic as a flowchart" and it appears in the panel.

• Text — read and written as plain Markdown.
• Sequence · Flowchart — written as Mermaid, and reads return real Mermaid, so agents can re-read and edit their own diagrams (full round-trip).
• Drawing — created from Mermaid flowcharts or Excalidraw skeletons (editable shapes); reads return a textual summary.

Unlike AI task sharing, notes are not split per Space — there is one global set.

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