Outliner · private testing
The day is the page.
Notes, todos and drafts are rows in one tree. Every day is a page in that tree, so nothing needs filing when you write it. Structure comes later, from indenting, folding and zooming.
2 open · 1 overdue · 1 done
- Kickoff with @Martyna
- ⚑ Send the revised scopeMon 31
- Chase the signed order form2 days over
- Share the recording
- They want the migration split in two #planning
- Q3 targetson 3 days
- Retention is the only number that moves the roadmap
- Why the day is the pageprose412 words
- Every filing decision is a small tax on writing something down, and the tax is charged at the worst moment, before you know what the note is.
- Durable Objects: WebSocket hibernationcloudflare.com
Time is the spine
A week is the same outliner, one level up
Content hangs off years, months, weeks and days. A week view is not a calendar, it is a list of days that fold into whatever is under them. A month folds into weeks. So there is never a decision about where a note goes. It goes on today, and you move it later if it earns the move.
Clicking a bullet makes that row the page, with breadcrumbs back up. Tabs keep several of those open at once, each with its own history.
One node, many days
Put a row on another day and it is still the same row
A node can sit on as many days as you want without being copied. Edit it in one place and it changes in all of them, because there is only one of it. That is what makes a running decision log, a recurring agenda or an article written over two weeks work at all.
Those rows keep a dotted violet ring on the bullet and a chip counting the days they appear on, so a shared row is never a surprise.
Rows are not just text
One unit, several states
Todos
⌘⏎ turns a line into a todo. Priority runs from ⌘⌥1 for urgent down to ⌘⌥4 for low. Due dates sit on the row, and the checkbox is the only thing allowed to turn green.
Prose
⌘⇧P renders a node's children as paragraphs with document leading instead of bullets. The parent keeps a word count. It is still one node in the same tree.
Properties
Typed fields on a row: text, number, date, select, checkbox, and a reference to another node. Structure for the rows that need it, nothing on the rows that do not.
Files and links
Paste files onto a row and they attach. Drag from the bullet and the row leaves the app as its text plus those files. Attachments are a desktop feature.
The keyboard
Every structural move is a key
- New line
- ⏎
- Indent, outdent
- ⇥⇧⇥
- Move among siblings
- ⌘⇧↑⌘⇧↓
- Collapse or expand
- ⌘↑⌘↓
- Zoom into a line
- ⌘.
- Out one level
- ⌘,
- Previous, next day
- ⌘⌥←⌘⌥→
- Turn into a todo
- ⌘⏎
- Actions for this line
- ⌘K
- Every shortcut
- ⌘/
Text pasted as a Markdown outline comes in as rows. Copying rows out gives Markdown back.
Where the writing lives
On your machine first
Desktop
The document is a SQLite file the app owns, written as an operation log with its own backups. Attachments are content-addressed files next to it. It works with no network and no account.
Browser
The browser build is a preview. It holds one snapshot in local storage and cannot take attachments. Durable storage in the browser is still being built.
Hosted sync
The sync service is deployed and in private testing. Its database and object storage are created in Cloudflare's EU jurisdiction, and the server orders the operation log without decoding the bodies of the operations in it.
What that is not
Sync is not end-to-end encrypted today, and the app does not talk to the sync service yet. Both are described accurately on this page rather than promised.
Where the build is
Honest state, September 2026
Working
- Rows, indent and outdent, folding, zoom, tabs
- Day, week and month views over the same tree
- One node placed on many days
- Todos with priority and due dates
- Prose mode and typed node properties
- Bold, italic, mentions, tags and links in a row
- Attachments and drag out to Finder, on desktop
- Undo and redo over the whole operation log
Not built yet
- Search across days
- The todos and threads views
- Sign-in and sync inside the app
- The inline prompt that edits the outline
- Durable browser storage
- A public download
There is no sign-up. Rationable is in private testing and this page exists so the people testing it, and the services it authenticates against, have something accurate to read.