Environment variables¶

This page documents the environment variables noteui reads and the WebDAV credential fallback file that works alongside them.

NOTES_ROOT¶

Overrides the default notes directory. When set, this bypasses configured workspace profiles for that session and disables in-app workspace switching.

Default:

$HOME/notes

Use this when:

• your notes live somewhere else
• you want separate note collections
• you are testing noteui against a temporary notes tree

NOTEUI_CONFIG¶

Points noteui at a specific config file path.

Use this when:

• you want to keep config outside the default config directory
• you maintain multiple noteui setups
• you want per-project config behavior

This only changes config.toml lookup. It does not move the WebDAV credential fallback file; that still lives under noteui/secrets.toml inside the user config directory.

NOTEUI_EDITOR¶

Overrides the editor used to open notes.

The value may be either a bare executable name such as nvim or a command string with arguments such as code -w or hx --wait. noteui splits the string into an executable plus arguments before appending the note path.

Examples:

• NOTEUI_EDITOR="nvim"
• NOTEUI_EDITOR="code -w"
• EDITOR="emacsclient -c --alternate-editor=\"\""

This is not full shell execution. Shell aliases, shell functions, and other shell-only syntax are still not supported.

Resolution order is:

1. NOTEUI_EDITOR
2. EDITOR
3. nvim

XDG_STATE_HOME¶

Changes the location of the noteui state file.

Default state path:

$HOME/.local/state/noteui/state.json

XDG_DATA_HOME¶

Influences the user trash location used when deleting notes or categories.

This matters because noteui deletes into trash rather than immediately hard-deleting content.

WebDAV credential fallback file¶

For WebDAV sync profiles, username_env, password_env, and token_env hold environment variable names, not the secret values themselves.

When noteui resolves one of those names at sync time, it uses this order:

1. the current process environment
2. noteui/secrets.toml inside the user config directory, if the env var is unset or empty

The default secrets.toml path depends on the platform:

• Linux and other XDG-style systems: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/noteui/secrets.toml or $HOME/.config/noteui/secrets.toml
• macOS: $HOME/Library/Application Support/noteui/secrets.toml
• Windows: %AppData%\noteui\secrets.toml

This file is separate from config.toml. Setting NOTEUI_CONFIG does not change where noteui looks for secrets.toml.

File format¶

Use a flat TOML file with top-level string keys whose names exactly match the configured env var names.

Example:

NOTEUI_NEXTCLOUD_USERNAME = "alice"
NOTEUI_NEXTCLOUD_PASSWORD = "app-password-here"
NOTEUI_WEBDAV_TOKEN = "app-token-for-another-profile"

Practical rules:

• keep the file flat; noteui reads top-level string keys by exact name
• env vars win over secrets.toml when both define the same key
• you can keep credentials for multiple sync profiles in the same file
• noteui reads the file at sync time, not at startup or config load
• malformed TOML causes the WebDAV auth step to fail until the file is fixed
• noteui does not create or update this file for you

Example shell setup¶

export NOTES_ROOT="$HOME/my-notes"
export NOTEUI_EDITOR="nvim"
export NOTEUI_CONFIG="$HOME/.config/noteui/config.toml"

$env:NOTES_ROOT = "$HOME\my-notes"
$env:NOTEUI_EDITOR = "nvim"
$env:NOTEUI_CONFIG = "$HOME\.config\noteui\config.toml"