Capacities
Replaceable in one session with an AI coding agent.
A note app organised by object type rather than by folder: people, books, meetings and ideas are each their own kind of thing, linked together.
Build me the object-based notes system that replaces Capacities. The idea worth copying: **organise by what a thing is, not by where you put it.** A folder forces one location; a type lets a note about a meeting be a meeting, linked to the people and the project, findable from all three. STACK - Node 20+ with Fastify, server-rendered HTML with a little vanilla JS - SQLite through better-sqlite3, WAL mode, FTS5 across everything - Markdown on disk as the source of truth, the database as an index - Caddy in front THE DATA MODEL - objects: id, type_id, title, body_md, created_at, updated_at, path - types: id, name, icon, fields_json, template_md - values: object_id, field_key, value_text, value_object_id — a field pointing at another object is what builds the graph - links: from_object_id, to_object_id, context — with the surrounding sentence - daily: date, object_id TYPES WORTH HAVING BY DEFAULT - Person, meeting, project, book, article, idea, place. Seven types cover most of what anybody records - Each with a few fields and a template. **Keep the field count small** — a type with fifteen fields is a form, and nobody fills in a form to write a note - A type can be added or edited at any time, and existing objects gain the new field empty, with no migration THE DAILY NOTE AS THE ENTRY POINT - Everything starts in today's note. Mention a person and it links; write about a meeting and turn that line into a meeting object with one key - **Converting a line into a typed object without leaving the flow of writing is the whole ergonomic argument.** If it takes a dialogue, people write into the daily note forever and nothing gets structured VIEWS PER TYPE - A list of every object of a type, with its fields as columns, sortable and filterable - On a person: every meeting they were in, every note mentioning them, gathered automatically from the links - **That automatic gathering is what replaces filing.** Nothing is put anywhere; everything is found by relationship SEARCH AND LINKS - FTS5 across titles and bodies, prefix matching, type-filtered - Wiki links autocompleting against existing objects, creating lazily on first write - Backlinks with context, and unlinked mentions offered PORTABILITY, WHICH MATTERS MORE HERE THAN USUAL - Markdown files on disk with the fields in frontmatter. **The type system must be expressible in plain files** or the whole archive depends on your software existing - The index rebuildable from the files, always - Export is just the folder WHAT MATTERS MOST Typing a line without leaving the writing, and automatic gathering on each object. Together they mean organisation happens as a by-product of writing rather than as a separate chore.
What you lose
- Typed objects with their own templates and views
- A daily note that files things by type automatically
- A polished application on every platform
- Sync with nothing to configure
If you would rather not build
- Obsidian with properties and Dataview, which is this pattern
- Logseq, similar with an outline model
- Markdown with frontmatter and a small indexer
The escape hatch
open source · no votes, no paid placement
Obsidian Dataview alternatives — Silverbullet
$0Self-hosted markdown notebook with queries over frontmatter.
silverbulletmd/silverbulletfree · open source
Why this verdict
our own opinion · changed only by a person
76/100
Verdict yes at 76: markdown with frontmatter plus an index, which is a well-trodden shape. The one-key conversion from a written line is the ergonomics that make or break it.
History
tracked since 14 Aug 2026 · nothing is ever overwritten
Nothing recorded yet. This chart fills in once the page has visitors, votes or prompt copies — it will not draw a flat line to look busy.
Questions about Capacities
answered from the record above
Is Capacities free?
No — the plan we track is $9.99 a month. Pro at $9.99/month billed annually, around $12.99 monthly.
Can you replace Capacities by building your own?
YES. Replaceable in one session with an AI coding agent. Replacement score 76 out of 100, build time one session. Read what you lose before you decide.
How much does Capacities cost?
$9.99 a month on Pro — $119.88 a year. Recorded 14 Aug 2026.
What do you lose by replacing Capacities?
Typed objects with their own templates and views; A daily note that files things by type automatically; A polished application on every platform; Sync with nothing to configure. If any of those carry weight for you, keep paying.
Is there an open-source alternative to Capacities?
Yes: Obsidian Dataview alternatives — Silverbullet, AppFlowy. The prompt on this page is for when you want it your way instead.
Related entries
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