Show HN: NoteTech – Create personal automations by writing notes | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: NoteTech – Create personal automations by writing notes

simpltech.ai

136 pointskenstler34 comments

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Could write some documentation with some examples of common commands?

Otherwise, it seems like “guess the verb” in a text adventure.

[Oops, edited before I saw the reply.]

Hi! A good general point.

We're doing a few things to try to guide the user:

1. We include ~26 fully-formed "Example" and "Template" notes in the app - these are intended to show users what they can do, but they can also be copied and used as-is or edited.

2. When users write new notes, we use a custom keyboard tool called "AutoPrompt" to show the user what actions they can take in each section. It includes prompts like "Search reddit for...", etc. that is inserted into the text entry and the user completes the statement. (You can see this in the vid on our home page).

3. If users write incorrect or wrong things in the note, they get a response back that instructs them what they need to correct.

Admittedly, as a notes-based interface there's a tradeoff we're trying to balance on flexibility vis-a-vis unstructured text input, and guardrails to inform the user. Appreciate any further feedback you can share!

That sounds useful for someone who already signed up, but I’d rather read them before signing up or installing anything. The documentation is how I decide if it’s worth looking further.

(I also don’t play videos or animations, and try to ignore them if they autoplay. They are usually too fast or too slow. A slideshow that you step through is okay.)

Maybe I’m not your target audience, though?

Ah - I assumed you were talking about the in-app experience. My bad!

Point well taken and we'll definitely add more details/docs on the site.

Thanks!

I just wanted to add that this information would be useful to me too, and I did watch the video. Also, I would be curious to know what integrations you already have and plan to add.

If you highlight the actions in the text with something like a differnet background color, it would be clear what it will trigger and over time the user would remember these actions. It would also be clearer to see them in predefined notes.

Love this - thank you!

Love the UX, AI is unlocking a completely new ux paradigm and kudos to you for pushing it forward!

Appreciate the feedback!

This is interesting. I assume you're using an LLM to generate the code that runs these automations? Like "compiling" the prompt to code?

Yes, but instead of "compiling" directly to generated code, we generate an assembly of code modules.

Fun related anecdote. I learned to program Amiga BASIC when I was around 12 by copying games from the back of Amiga magazine. At the same time, my sister was learning to read and write. As a nerdy big brother, I set out to write something where she could type plain english instructions and it would do what she typed. Playing Zork made this seem very feasible at least to my 12 year old mind. I never finished the project, but have been thinking about something like this again lately.

This is cool in a similar way that Forth is cool.

explain

"It is a language that makes complexity painful, but which reveals that a surprising amount can be accomplished without introducing any." - https://blog.information-superhighway.net/what-the-hell-is-f...

Interesting idea. I liked the AI button, but had difficulty even finding it since you need to click into a line item before you can see it.

Also, I wanted to "test" my work before deploying it, but that seems not possible?

Thanks for the feedback!

Yes - at present, a note needs to be deployed before you can test. Then you can make a change, and redeploy. We can look at making this a bit more seamless in future iterations.

Re: the AI button - any suggestion on how we might improve there?

Perhaps using the same nomenclature for both? In the tooltip you call it an Autoprompt, but the icon itself just says "AI". Also, I typed some steps in, and expected to need to review before deploying since I didn't have any "AI" or "autoprompt" to help.

Maybe some sort of more obvious workflow that it's "done" and can be tested?

The video shows actions on external services. Can NoteTech be used to automate phone activities e.g. "Turn phone silent from 10pm to 6am" , "When John is calling, ring at full volume" ?

I think you can already do some of this in iOS with the Shortcuts app

Presently our focus is more on enabling automations that integrate with external services, but we do intend to enable some phone actions that make sense in that context.

Seems pretty interesting. What are the external services that you are supporting currently. Also can I add some API calls with this?

Not available in Canada unfortunately. I'm excited to see, always looking for personal automation tools

It's not available in my country via Play Store - any chance of enabling? I'm in Serbia.

This looks just like "programming with english" that comes up every few years.

Is there a desktop version planned? Watched the video. I'd love to have a Desktop version.

Yes!

hi, I could not find it in play store in Australia, but I really like the idea and love to try. Would it be possible for you to send an apk to my email (about)?

1. Could you make a web version? (I don't own a smartphone).

2. Are you looking for investors?

1. We can do one for web. 2. Would love to chat about it.

1. Awesome! 2. Great! breck7@gmail.com

Looks interesting. But you should add a note that it is not available in Europe (or at least France) for Android

In the Netherlands it doesn't work either

Not available in India :(

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