Release Notes

A build configuration issue could cause the Apple Silicon (arm64) release to ship with the Intel build's rounded icon instead of its own correct square-edged icon. Fixed at the source so each architecture's build only ever produces its own icon.

Release files are now named "silicon" and "intel" for clearer differentiation, replacing the previous "arm64" / unlabeled naming.

Every new install now starts with a full 30-day trial — no account, no credit card, nothing held back. Buy a license anytime during or after the trial to keep going, for a one-time $27, no subscription.

Enter your license key once from the License… menu and WIP Notes checks in with the store a single time to confirm it — then it's done. From that point on, WIP Notes works exactly like it always has: fully offline, no further check-ins, ever.

Paste from Excel (or any spreadsheet app) and WIP Notes creates a fully editable table. Drag column edges to resize, click to select individual cells, or shift-click to select a range. Tables round-trip through import and export correctly.

A new Checklist button in the toolbar inserts a task list. Click any item's checkbox to mark it complete — the item gets a strikethrough and stays in place. Checklists export as plain-text task syntax ([ ] / [x]) and round-trip through HTML import correctly.

AI assistants can now import a local HTML file directly into WIP Notes without needing it hosted anywhere. Call import_from_file with a notebook_id and a local file path — the file is read from disk, parsed as rich text, and stored as a new note. Tool count: 18 (was 17).

get_note now renders checklist items as plain-text task syntax — unchecked items as [ ] item and checked items as [x] item — so AI assistants can read and act on task lists correctly.

Both import_from_url and import_from_file now parse taskList HTML correctly, converting task-list markup into live, checkable checklist items in the note.

The import_from_url tool now accepts two new optional parameters: include_images (boolean, default false) and max_images (integer, default 20). When include_images is true, the server fetches each image found on the page and embeds it as a base64 data URL — so the note is fully self-contained and displays images correctly even when offline. Failed image fetches are skipped silently; the rest of the note still imports. max_images caps the total to avoid unexpectedly large notes on image-heavy pages.

File → Import from URL… opens a dialog where you paste any web page address. WIP Notes fetches the page, strips navigation and chrome, and creates a new note with the content — headings, bold, italic, lists, links, and tables all preserved as fully editable rich text. No browser extension required.

File → Import… now accepts Excel files (.xlsx), including spreadsheets exported from Apple Numbers, Google Sheets, or any Excel-compatible app. Each sheet is imported as an editable table. Multi-sheet workbooks get one section per sheet with the sheet name as a heading.

Tables are now preserved when importing from HTML files, Word documents (.docx), web URLs, and spreadsheets. Imported tables are fully editable — add rows, edit cells, and apply formatting just like any other note content. Column spans and row spans are carried through correctly.

The Batch Import folder scan now includes .xlsx files alongside all previously supported formats.

AI assistants connected via MCP can now import a web page directly into WIP Notes by URL. Call import_from_url with a notebook_id and url — the page is fetched, stripped of navigation noise, and stored as a rich-text note with full formatting preserved including tables. Tool count: 17 (was 16).

A mismatch between the app's expected data folder name and the actual folder on disk caused the database to fail silently on startup. When that happened, all IPC handlers went unregistered — so the Create button in the New Notebook dialog appeared to do nothing, and typed text in notes was never saved.

Root cause: a prior session renamed the Application Support folder from "wip-notes" to "WIP Notes" (to match the MCP server's expected path), but the installed app still pointed to the old name. Fixed by updating the app to use "WIP Notes" as the canonical folder name, with automatic migration: on first launch it renames the old folder if present, so no data is lost on any machine regardless of what it currently has on disk.

If the database cannot be opened for any reason, the app now shows a dialog with the exact path and error message, then quits cleanly — rather than launching into an empty, non-functional state with no indication of what went wrong.

The previous icon had a rounded-square shape baked into the artwork itself. macOS 26 applies its own Liquid Glass mask and specular highlight over every app icon — stacking that on top of the artwork's built-in rounding produced visible fuzziness in the Dock and the Cmd+Tab app switcher. The icon is now exported full-bleed (no built-in rounding) so the system mask lands cleanly with sharp edges and correct sheen.

The version displayed in WIP Notes ▸ About WIP Notes was hardcoded and permanently showed "1.0.0" regardless of the actual build. It now reads directly from the app bundle, so it will always match the installed version going forward.

Deleting a Note, a Notes Group, or a Notebook now asks for confirmation first — deletions can't be undone, and the delete buttons are easy to hit by accident. Each dialog says exactly what will happen:

Notes: "This can't be undone." Groups: its notes are kept and simply move out of the group — the dialog says so, with a live count. Notebooks: warns that the notebook and all the notes inside (live count) will be deleted. Enter confirms, Esc or clicking outside cancels.

The Confirm Delete, Insert Link, and New Notebook dialogs now share the same hover and pressed states on every button, so it's always clear what's interactive.

Edit ▸ Find (or Cmd+F) focuses the search bar in Note mode. Enter jumps to the next match, Shift+Enter to the previous (both wrap around). The current match is highlighted in orange and scrolled into view, with a "2 of 14" counter in the search bar. Esc clears the search and returns to the note.

In Manual sort, drag a group's handle onto a Notebook in the sidebar to move the group and all of its notes there. The group lands at the bottom of the target Notebook with its note order preserved.

Dragging a note or group now shows a solid floating preview that follows the cursor for the entire drag, and groups animate their notes out of the way in real time as you drag a note in, out, or through them — matching the feel of modern macOS apps.

Selecting multiple paragraphs with different styles (headings, quotes, code) and choosing a style from the toolbar dropdown now restyles every selected paragraph. The dropdown shows "Mixed" for mixed selections.

Notes dropped into a group now land exactly where you point — between specific notes or appended via the group header — instead of an arbitrary position.

The icon now follows Apple's icon grid (proper margins), so Tahoe renders it at standard size and full sharpness in the Dock, Finder, and Spotlight.

Note Pads on the left, notes list in the middle, editor on the right. All three panels are independently resizable and collapsible — widths are saved and restored every session.

Headings (H1–H3), bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, inline code, code blocks, blockquotes, bullet and numbered lists, text color, highlights, text alignment, tables, images, and hyperlinks. Saves continuously as you type — no Cmd+S ever required.

Organize work by project with Note Pads. Within each Note Pad, group related notes into named Note Groups. Apply one of seven color labels (Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple, Gray) to any Note Pad or individual note. Sort by label to cluster by status or priority.

Seven sort modes per Note Pad: Manual (drag to reorder), Date Modified, Date Created, A → Z, Z → A, Labels ↑, and Labels ↓. Each Note Pad remembers its own sort mode independently.

Bring in plain text, RTF, Markdown (raw or rendered), Word (.docx), HTML, PDF, Fountain, JSON, and YAML. Batch import an entire folder and it becomes a new Note Pad automatically.

Export individual notes, all notes sharing a color label, or an entire Note Pad. Output to PDF, Word, HTML, Markdown, RTF, plain text, JSON, Fountain, or YAML.

Toggle Page Mode for a paginated letter-size canvas with visible page boundaries. Insert page breaks manually, then print or export to a clean, properly-paginated PDF.

All notes are stored in a local SQLite database on your Mac. No account, no cloud sync, no network requests, no telemetry of any kind. Works fully offline, including on air-gapped machines.