Writing Notes

Atlas gives you two ways to work with notes: use the editor in the Files tab, or just ask Atlas in chat. Both work on the same plain markdown files in your vault.

Creating a note

From the Files tab:

Click the + (new note) button in the toolbar
Choose a note type
Enter a name and optional folder path
Click Create — the note opens in the editor ready to write

From chat:

Just tell Atlas what you want:

“Create a note called ‘Sprint Planning’ in my Work folder.”

“Start a new meeting note for today’s design review.”

Atlas will create the file and confirm. You can follow up with: “Add an agenda section with items for each team member.”

Note types

When creating a note, you can choose a type that sets the initial template:

Type	Good for
Note	General-purpose writing, anything that doesn’t fit a specific category
Idea	Quick captures, brainstorms, things to develop later
Meeting	Meeting agendas, notes, and action items
Journal	Personal reflections and daily entries
Reference	Reference material, documentation, how-to guides

The type is stored in the note’s frontmatter as type: meeting (or whichever you chose). You can change it at any time by editing the frontmatter.

The markdown editor

The editor in the Files tab is a plain text markdown editor. What you see is what gets saved to disk — no hidden formatting, no conversion step.

Key editor features:

Syntax highlighting for headings, bold, links, code blocks, and more
Live preview toggle to see the rendered output
Auto-save — your changes are saved automatically as you type
Wiki-link autocomplete — type [[ and Atlas will suggest notes from your vault

Note structure

A well-structured note looks like this:

---
title: Sprint Planning
date: 2026-02-24
type: meeting
tags: [work, planning]
---

# Sprint Planning

## Goals for this sprint
- Ship the new onboarding flow
- Fix the search ranking bug

## Notes
Discussion points go here...

The --- block at the top is frontmatter (optional, but useful for organizing notes)
The # Heading is the note’s main title
Everything after is your content in standard markdown

Asking Atlas to update notes

You don’t have to open the editor to change a note. Ask Atlas in chat:

“Append my action items from today’s standup to the Sprint Planning note.”

“Update the Goals section in Sprint Planning — we decided to push the onboarding flow to next sprint.”

“Add a ‘Risks’ section to the Project Brief note.”

Atlas understands note structure and can target specific sections, append content, or make targeted replacements.

File preview before changes

When Atlas is about to modify an existing note, it can show you a diff preview first — a side-by-side view of what will change. This is especially useful for larger edits where you want to confirm before Atlas writes to disk.

The preview shows added lines in green and removed lines in red, just like a Git diff. Click Apply to confirm or Cancel to discard.