Apple Notes search & connection-discovery

apple-notes is an MCP server for semantic search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes — hybrid search, Swanson-ABC bridges, entity threads, and cited synthesis over everything they've written. Embeddings, search, BM25, clustering, and bridges run on-device; only synthesis generation calls an LLM (local OR cloud, the user's choice).

This skill covers (1) the one-time setup you must walk the user through, and (2) which tool to reach for, since the server exposes many.

When to Use This Skill

• Use when the user wants to find, recall, or look up something from their own Apple Notes ("search my notes for X", "what did I write about X", "did I ever note Y").
• Use when the user wants to surface non-obvious connections across their notes ("find bridges/connections across my notes", "what links X and Y", "show related notes").
• Use when the user wants to synthesize a position from their notes ("summarize what I think about X from my notes", "pull together everything I've written on X").
• Also use for "index my Apple Notes", tag/folder queries, and "what's connected to X".
• Do not use for creating reminders, or for non-Apple-Notes note systems.

First: is the MCP connected?

If apple-notes tools are not available, the server isn't registered yet — do the Setup below before anything else. If tools exist but a search returns "not indexed" or empty, run index-notes first (see Ranking caveats).

Setup (walk the user through this — it's the skill's real value)

The server reads Apple Notes' SQLite store directly, so the bun binary needs Full Disk Access. Steps, in order:

1. Install bun (if absent): brew install oven-sh/bun/bun
2. Clone + install deps:

   git clone https://github.com/connerkward/mcp-apple-notes
   cd mcp-apple-notes
   git checkout <reviewed-tag-or-commit>
   bun install
   

3. Grant Full Disk Access to bun. Run which bun, then open System Settings → Privacy & Security → Full Disk Access, click +, and add that exact bun binary path (commonly /opt/homebrew/bin/bun or /usr/local/bin/bun). Without this the server cannot read NoteStore.sqlite and every call fails with a permissions error. (bun install's postinstall tries to open this pane automatically.)
4. Register the MCP server (pick the user's client):
   • Claude Code: claude mcp add apple-notes -- bun /absolute/path/to/mcp-apple-notes/index.ts --stdio
   • Claude Desktop: add to claude_desktop_config.json:

     { "mcpServers": { "apple-notes": {
         "command": "/Users/<you>/.bun/bin/bun",
         "args": ["/Users/<you>/mcp-apple-notes/index.ts", "--stdio"] } } }
     

   • As a Claude Code plugin (bundles this skill too): /plugin marketplace add connerkward/ckw-skills then /plugin install apple-notes@connerkward.
5. Restart the client, then tell the user to ask "Index my Apple Notes" (or call index-notes). First index of ~1,800 notes takes a few seconds.

Tool map — which tool for which job

Tool	Use when
index-notes	First run, or to force a rebuild. Background job with live progress.
search-notes	Default search. Hybrid semantic + BM25, re-ranked. Optional folder, modifiedAfter, modifiedBefore. "What did I write about X."
find-notes	Exact substring match (like the Apple Notes search box). Use when the user wants a literal string, not meaning. Optional folder, date range.
get-note	Fetch one full note by title (fuzzy fallback).
list-notes	Notes by recency. Optional folder, date range, limit.
list-folders	All folders + note counts.
list-tags / search-by-tag	#hashtag inventory / notes carrying a given tag.
related-notes	Notes related to a given one via shared tags, [[wikilinks]], and vector similarity. "Show me related notes."
bridge-notes	Swanson-ABC bridges — non-obvious connections: pairs (A, C) not directly similar but both strongly tied to a shared intermediary B. "Find non-obvious connections across my notes." Optional folder, limit. No LLM.
feed	Ranked evidence-first connection stream (bridges + abstraction pairs + entity threads) as JSON. Optional limit.
entity-notes / list-entities	"Where else do I talk about Mercedes?" Entity chips → notes by mention weight. Needs the optional entity graph db (~/.mcp-apple-notes/layered_graph.db); if absent these report how to generate it.
get-tables	Pull pipe/tab tables out of a note.
create-note / update-note	Create or edit a note.
check-changes	Did notes change since last index? (does not trigger re-index)
index-health	Sync status, last-indexed time, note count. Run this if results seem stale.

For "synthesize what I think about X" the synthesis lives in the web app endpoint (GET /api/synthesize?q= at http://localhost:3741/ when run with bun index.ts), which writes a grounded answer with inline [n] citations back to source notes.

Ranking caveats (state these when results look off)

• Index before the first search. No index → empty/garbage results; run index-notes.
• Auto re-index: each search does ~1ms change detection and kicks ONE background incremental index if notes changed — search returns immediately from the current index and catches up when the job lands. If a just-edited note is missing, it's the catch-up lag; re-run the search.
• Score: score = RRF(vector, BM25) × title_boost × recency_factor.
• Temporal queries (recent, latest, today) auto-shift to a 1-day recency half-life at 70% weight; normal queries keep relevance primary (90-day half-life, 10%).
• Synthesis is the only cloud-capable part. It needs an LLM: local via LM Studio / Ollama (SYNTH_BASE_URL=http://localhost:1234/v1 SYNTH_MODEL=<model> OPENAI_API_KEY=local, notes stay on-device) or real OpenAI (funded OPENAI_API_KEY, defaults to gpt-4o-mini). Everything else — embeddings, search, BM25, clustering, bridges, entities — is on-device.

Limitations

• macOS and Apple Notes only; it does not search Obsidian, Notion, Google Docs, or other note stores.
• The MCP server needs local filesystem permissions to read Apple Notes data, so setup cannot be completed purely inside a remote shell.
• Search quality depends on a fresh local index. Recently edited notes may require check-changes, index-health, or a rerun after background indexing catches up.
• Entity tools require the optional layered graph database; without it, use hybrid search, exact search, related notes, or bridges instead.

Credits

Fork of RafalWilinski/mcp-apple-notes; this fork reads SQLite + protobuf directly and adds bridges, entities, feed, and synthesis. Authored by Conner K Ward. License MIT.