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Agent skill

Apple Notes Search

by sickn33 in sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills

Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server.

MITAuto-check passedAgent Workflows

Install Apple Notes Search

skills CLI
$ npx skills add sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills --skill apple-notes-search -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills apple-notes-search --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/skills/apple-notes-search .claude/skills/apple-notes-search && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
apple-notes-search
GitHub stars
47k
Used in
1 other repo
Token cost
~2k tokens
SKILL.md length
931 words
Files
1
Skills in repo
1,493
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
MIT

At a glance

Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server.

  • Works in 5 steps: Install bun (if absent): brew install… → Clone + install deps → Grant Full Disk Access to bun. Run which… → …
  • The user wants to find
  • SKILL.md covers When to Use This Skill, First: is the MCP connected?, Setup (walk the user through… and Tool map — which tool for…, plus 4 more sections
  • Calls bun, git and brew; reaches github.com; needs OPENAI_API_KEY

What it does

Apple Notes Search is an agent skill from sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills. Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server. Use when the user wants to find, recall, or synthesize something from their notes, or surface non-obvious bridges/related notes. macOS, on-device.

Its SKILL.md is about 2k tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. It is a single SKILL.md file with no bundled scripts.

It sits in Agent Workflows, covering MCP servers. It works with Model Context Protocol and macOS. The repository describes itself as: AAS Core is the local, agent-first control plane for complete catalog discovery, agent-owned selection, stack validation, and planning, backed by 2,400+ agentic skills. Includes… The licence is MIT.

When your agent uses it

  • The user wants to find
  • Synthesize something from their notes
  • Surface non-obvious bridges/related notes

Example prompts

  • “/apple-notes-search”

Requirements

  • A credential in OPENAI_API_KEY

Workflow steps

5 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

  1. Install bun (if absent): brew install oven-sh/bun/bun
  2. Clone + install deps
  3. Grant Full Disk Access to bun. Run which bun, then open System Settings →
  4. Register the MCP server (pick the user's client)
  5. Restart the client, then tell the user to ask "Index my Apple Notes" (or call

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 680176d. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    Shell commands in SKILL.md call:

    • bun
    • git
    • brew
    • claude

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    Hosts in commands or code, which the agent is likely to contact:

    • github.com

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names these keys or tokens, usually read from environment variables:

    • OPENAI_API_KEY

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Apple Notes Search loads about 2k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 71 tokens; SKILL.md has 931 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~71
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills at commit 680176d, republished under its MIT licence (© sickn33). 931 words, ~2,016 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/apple-notes-search/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder).
name
apple-notes-search
description
Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server. Use when the user wants to find, recall, or synthesize something from their notes, or surface non-obvious bridges/related notes. macOS, on-device.
risk
critical
source
community
source_repo
connerkward/mcp-apple-notes
source_type
community
date_added
2026-06-16
author
connerkward
tags
apple-notes, search, mcp, macos, semantic-search, knowledge
tools
claude-code
license
MIT
license_source
https://github.com/connerkward/mcp-apple-notes/blob/main/LICENSE

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:
    bash
    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:
      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

ToolUse when
index-notesFirst run, or to force a rebuild. Background job with live progress.
search-notesDefault search. Hybrid semantic + BM25, re-ranked. Optional folder, modifiedAfter, modifiedBefore. "What did I write about X."
find-notesExact substring match (like the Apple Notes search box). Use when the user wants a literal string, not meaning. Optional folder, date range.
get-noteFetch one full note by title (fuzzy fallback).
list-notesNotes by recency. Optional folder, date range, limit.
list-foldersAll folders + note counts.
list-tags / search-by-tag#hashtag inventory / notes carrying a given tag.
related-notesNotes related to a given one via shared tags, [[wikilinks]], and vector similarity. "Show me related notes."
bridge-notesSwanson-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.
feedRanked 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-tablesPull pipe/tab tables out of a note.
create-note / update-noteCreate or edit a note.
check-changesDid notes change since last index? (does not trigger re-index)
index-healthSync 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.

Show full SKILL.md (261 more words)Show less

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.

Example

User request:

Use @apple-notes-search for this task: Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server.

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.

© sickn33, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in skills/apple-notes-search of sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 680176d

Used in 1 other repository

We found 1 copy of this SKILL.md (exact, near-identical or edited) in other folders, from 1 other GitHub owner. This page covers the copy in sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills, which our catalogue first saw on October 7, 2026.

Compare with similar skills

Apple Notes Search next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Apple Notes Search compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Apple Notes Search this skillsickn33/agentic-awesome-skills47k1 repos~2kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Binggo MCPluovicter-collab/bilibinggo500—~1.2kAutomated safety check: PassProprietary
Cortex Mem MCPsopaco/cortex-mem313—~2.8kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Mps Project ManagementJetBrains/MPS1.7k—~2.2kAutomated safety check: PassApache-2.0
Premiere Pro MCPhetpatel-11/Adobe_Premiere_Pro_MCP668—~1.3kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Gearcoleco Romhackingdrhelius/Gearcoleco142—~3.9kAutomated safety check: PassGPL-3.0

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Works with

Categories

Questions about Apple Notes Search

What does Apple Notes Search do?

Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server. Apple Notes Search is an agent skill from sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills. Semantic + keyword search and connection-discovery across the user's own Apple Notes via the apple-notes MCP server.

When should I use Apple Notes Search?

Apple Notes Search fits situations like: the user wants to find; synthesize something from their notes; surface non-obvious bridges/related notes.

How do I install Apple Notes Search in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills --skill apple-notes-search -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/apple-notes-search in sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills) into .claude/skills/apple-notes-search in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Apple Notes Search in Codex?

Run `npx skills add sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills --skill apple-notes-search -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (skills/apple-notes-search in sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills) into .agents/skills/apple-notes-search in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Apple Notes Search in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills --skill apple-notes-search -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/apple-notes-search, .gemini/skills/apple-notes-search, .github/skills/apple-notes-search and .opencode/skills/apple-notes-search in your project.

What does Apple Notes Search need to run?

Going by SKILL.md and its folder, Apple Notes Search needs the command-line tools its instructions call (bun, git, brew and claude) and credentials named OPENAI_API_KEY. Our summary lists: A credential in OPENAI_API_KEY.

Does Apple Notes Search access the network?

SKILL.md names 1 domain. In commands or code: github.com; the agent is likely to contact it when it follows the instructions. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Apple Notes Search safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. Review the folder before installing.

What licence does Apple Notes Search use?

Apple Notes Search is published under the MIT licence (declared in SKILL.md). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Apple Notes Search use?

About 2k tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 8.1k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full.

What are the alternatives to Apple Notes Search?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Apple Notes Search: Binggo MCP (luovicter-collab/bilibinggo, 500 stars), Cortex Mem MCP (sopaco/cortex-mem, 313 stars), Mps Project Management (JetBrains/MPS, 1.7k stars) and Premiere Pro MCP (hetpatel-11/Adobe_Premiere_Pro_MCP, 668 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Apple Notes Search?

sickn33 (a GitHub user) maintains it in sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills, which has 47,379 GitHub stars. The repository holds 1,493 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on October 9, 2026.

Source: sickn33/agentic-awesome-skills on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.