Organizing Your Notes

Now we'll move to keeping order. Folders are subjects; notes are chapters or lectures inside them. The sidebar shows the whole tree, the Library shows it as tiles (chapter 3), and a few tools keep the tree tidy over a semester: moving, archiving, the Trash, tags, and the Inbox that catches quick thoughts from anywhere on the Mac.

The sidebar tree

• Folder rows ① show the folder's icon in its color. Click the chevron to expand or collapse; the folder's notes ② follow its subfolders. Rest the pointer on a folder and a + appears at its right end to make a note inside it. An expanded folder with nothing in it reads No notes yet.
• Not in a Folder ③ lists notes at the top level of the notes folder.
• The four sections ④ appear only when they have rows.
• The bottom bar ⑤: + opens a menu with New Note (⌘N) and New Folder (⌥⌘N); the trash button moves the selected notes to the Trash. While several notes are selected the bar reads 3 selected.

Hide the sidebar with ⌃⌘S. Show a folder's notes as tiles by opening the Library (⌥⌘0).

Right-click in the sidebar

A folder: New Note, New Folder Inside, Rename Folder, Color (a submenu), Icon (a submenu), Reveal in Finder, and Move Folder to Trash.

A note: Rename, Move to Folder (a submenu: Not in a Folder, then every folder), Reveal in Finder, Copy Link, and Move to Trash.

Rename turns the row into a field: type, then Return to keep or Escape to cancel. The Library's tiles offer the same commands plus Lock This Note and Archive (chapter 3).

Moving notes

One note: right-click it and choose Move to Folder. Several at once: ⌘-click or Shift-click notes in the sidebar; the detail area then reads 3 Notebooks Selected — Choose what to do with all of them. with a Move to Folder menu and a Move to Trash button.

Archiving

When a course ends, right-click its notes in the Library and choose Archive. Archived notes leave the tree and gather in a collapsed Archived section at the bottom of the sidebar. They stay out of search unless you ask — type is:archived in the search field — and Replace in All Notes leaves them alone. Right-click an archived row for Unarchive or Reveal in Finder.

In the file, archiving writes one line at the top of the note; any other Markdown app still opens it.

The Trash and Recently Deleted

Move to Trash puts a note or folder into the macOS Trash — nothing is deleted outright. Cocoa asks first for folders (Move “Accounting II” to the Trash?) and for notes trashed from the bottom bar (Move 3 notebooks to the Trash? — You can get them back from the Trash.).

For thirty days a trashed note also appears under Recently Deleted in the sidebar, with how long ago it went ("2 days ago"). Right-click a row: Put Back returns it to its folder; Remove from This List stops listing it (the file stays in the Trash until you empty it).

Tags

A note can carry tags. They are written in the note's front matter — a tags: line at the very top of the file — or added with the Add Tag to Note action in the Shortcuts app. The Tags column in the Library's table view (⌘3) shows them, and tag:exam in the search field finds every note carrying a tag; the suggestion list offers your existing tags as you type.

The Inbox: capturing from anywhere

Press ⌥Space in any app and a small Quick Capture panel floats up. Type ①, choose where it goes ② — the Inbox (a folder Cocoa makes the first time) or an existing note, appended at the end — and press ⌘↩ or click Save ③. Press ⌥Space again, or Escape, to hide the panel; a draft you have not saved stays there. Save is greyed while the panel is empty. If no notes folder is open the panel says No notes folder is open to capture into. and keeps your text. Change the key under Settings › General › Global shortcut.

Other ways in from outside the app:

• Save to Cocoa in any app's Share menu — plain text or one web link becomes a new note. Save (Return), Cancel (Escape).
• New Note from Selection under the app menu › Services of any Mac app — the selected text lands in the Inbox without Cocoa coming forward. With nothing selected: No text was selected.
• Shortcuts actions: Create Note, Append to Note, Search Notes, Open Note, Get Note Content, Add Tag to Note. Two also answer Siri: "Create a note in Cocoa" and "Search Cocoa".
• AppleScript: create note, append to note, search notes, open note — for Keyboard Maestro, Hazel, Alfred and Raycast.
• Links: Copy Link (⌘L) copies a link that opens the note from a calendar event, a task app or another note.

Keeping the Library readable

• Give every subject a color and an icon; the sidebar, the breadcrumb and the tiles all use them.
• Use Sort (Manual, Name, Date Modified, Date Created, Size) in the Library, or the table view (⌘3) and its column headers, to see what you have not touched.
• Nest folders when a subject splits — Accounting II › Exams — with New Folder Inside.
• Lock private notes from the Library; Archive finished ones.

Maya's end of semester

Exams over, Maya opens the Library, ⌘-clicks the fourteen Accounting II notes, and right-clicks › Archive. The folder is empty in the tree; the Archived section holds the notes, and search stays clean. Her Inbox has nine quick captures from the term; she reads each and uses Move to Folder. A duplicate goes to the Trash and shows under Recently Deleted; a week later she changes her mind and clicks Put Back.

Summary

• The sidebar tree: folders, notes, Not in a Folder, and sections for saved searches, conflicts, archived and recently deleted notes.
• Move notes with Move to Folder, alone or several at once; files and attachments move with them.
• Archive ends a course; archived notes stay out of search unless you type is:archived.
• The Trash is the macOS Trash; Recently Deleted offers Put Back for thirty days.
• Quick Capture (⌥Space), the Share menu, Services, Shortcuts and AppleScript all file into the Inbox.

Common mistakes

• Emptying the macOS Trash and expecting Put Back to work.
• Searching for an archived note without is:archived.
• Renaming notes in Finder while Cocoa is open — rename in the app so links and attachments follow.

Best practices

• One folder per course; subfolders only when a course needs them.
• Empty the Inbox weekly.
• Archive rather than trash at the end of a course.

Keyboard shortcuts used

Related features to learn next

• Chapter 3, The Library — the same tree as tiles.
• Chapter 10, Search and Navigation — operators and saved searches.
• Chapter 13, Import, Export, Backups and Sync.