AIMO

English | 简体中文 | Website

AI-first card memos. Capture a thought in one card; retrieval, linking, and review are built in. Your data stays on your machine, and can become private memory for your agents.

Positioning

One card, one thought. AI is a first-class capability, not a bolted-on button.

	AIMO	Document knowledge base	Capture-only tools
How you write	A stream of cards	Long documents you organize	Short captures
AI	First-class: search, links, review, memory	Plugin or add-on	Little or none
Where data lives	Your server or computer	Local or self-hosted	Usually the cloud
Getting started	Three-line Docker, or desktop / Android	Assemble a workflow	Sign up

✨ Core Features

🤖 AI Capabilities

• Smart Summarization - AI automatically generates note summaries, extracting key information quickly
• Semantic Search - Vector-based search powered by OpenAI Embedding, understanding meaning rather than keyword matching
• Intelligent Associations - Automatically discovers relationships between notes, building a visual knowledge graph
• Daily Recommendations - Surface "On This Day" notes to rediscover past ideas
• Spaced Repetition - Built-in review so notes come back to you instead of disappearing into the archive

📝 Note Management

• Color Tags - 10+ color labels for intuitive note categorization
• Category Management - Multi-level category system for flexible knowledge organization
• Version History - Track note modifications, revert anytime
• Relation Graph - Visualize references and relationships between notes

🔍 Discovery & Search

• Full-text Search - Quickly search note titles and content
• Tag Filtering - Filter notes by tags
• Calendar Heatmap - Visualize note activity, click dates to filter
• Smart Sorting - Sort by time, relevance, and more

💻 Multi-Platform Support

• Web App - Responsive design for desktop and mobile browsers
• Desktop Client - Tauri app that opens https://aimo.plus, for macOS, Windows, and Linux
• Mobile App - Android APK support, iOS pending release
• Browser Extension - Quick web content saving (in development)

🎨 Personalization

• Dark/Light Theme - One-click switching, easy on the eyes
• PWA Support - Install as desktop app, works offline
• Keyboard Shortcuts - Ctrl+K quick search for efficient operation

📸 Screenshots

Smart Note Editor	Semantic Search	Knowledge Graph

Multimedia Support	AI Explore	Theme Switching

🐳 Docker Deployment (Recommended)

All you need is Docker — no MySQL or any other dependency to pre-install. docker-compose.yml orchestrates the full stack: a MySQL database and the AIMO app, with tables created and initialized automatically on startup.

Quick Start

# 1. Download the deployment files (no need to clone the whole repo)
mkdir aimo && cd aimo
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ximing/aimo/master/docker-compose.yml
curl -o .env https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ximing/aimo/master/.env.docker.example

# 2. Edit .env and fill in the two required settings:
#    JWT_SECRET       —— a random secret, e.g. openssl rand -base64 32
#    OPENAI_API_KEY   —— OpenAI API key (for semantic search and other AI features)
#    No MySQL config needed — compose ships with one and wires it up automatically

# 3. Start
docker compose up -d

Once it's up, visit http://localhost:3000 and register the first account to get started.

💡 The first startup pulls images and initializes MySQL, which takes about 1–2 minutes. Follow the progress with: docker compose logs -f app

⚠️ After registering your own account, consider setting ALLOW_REGISTRATION=false in .env and restarting with docker compose up -d to prevent others from signing up.

Data Persistence

All data is persisted on the host machine under ./data, not inside containers. Removing containers, pulling new images, or upgrading versions will not lose any data:

aimo/
├── docker-compose.yml
├── .env              # Configuration (contains JWT_SECRET — keep it safe)
└── data/
    ├── mysql/        # MySQL relational data (users, notes, categories, tags, etc.)
    ├── lancedb/      # LanceDB vector data (semantic search index)
    └── attachments/  # Attachment files (images, documents, etc.)

Back up data — stop the services, then copy the data/ directory together with .env:

docker compose down
cp -r data ~/backup/aimo-data-$(date +%Y%m%d)
cp .env ~/backup/aimo-data-$(date +%Y%m%d).env

Move to another machine — repeat the Quick Start steps on the new machine, overwrite data/ and .env with your backups, then run docker compose up -d again.

Custom data directory — to store data elsewhere (e.g. a NAS volume), edit docker-compose.yml and replace the ./data prefix in the three volumes with your target absolute path, e.g. - /volume1/aimo/mysql:/var/lib/mysql.

Upgrading

docker compose pull
docker compose up -d

The new container runs database schema migrations automatically on startup (both MySQL tables and LanceDB vector data upgrade themselves) — no manual steps needed. Backing up the data/ directory before upgrading is recommended.

Using an External MySQL (Optional)

If you already have a MySQL 8.0+ instance, you can skip the bundled MySQL container and run a single app container:

docker run -d \
  --name aimo \
  -p 3000:3000 \
  --env-file .env \
  -v $(pwd)/data/lancedb:/app/lancedb_data \
  -v $(pwd)/data/attachments:/app/attachments \
  ghcr.io/ximing/aimo:stable

In this case, point MYSQL_HOST in your .env at your database.

🛠️ Local Development

Requirements

• Node.js >= 20.0
• pnpm >= 10.0
• MySQL >= 8.0 or MariaDB >= 10.6
• OpenAI API Key - For AI features

Steps

# 1. Clone the project
git clone https://github.com/ximing/aimo.git
cd aimo

# 2. Install dependencies
pnpm install

# 3. Setup MySQL database
# Create database
mysql -u root -p
CREATE DATABASE aimo CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;
EXIT;

# Or use Docker to start MySQL
docker compose up -d mysql

# 4. Configure environment variables
cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env, fill in MySQL connection info, JWT_SECRET and OPENAI_API_KEY

# 5. Start development server
pnpm dev

# The app will start at http://localhost:3000

Common Commands

pnpm dev:web       # Start frontend only
pnpm dev:server    # Start backend only
pnpm dev:client    # Start the Tauri desktop shell (local web in development)
pnpm build         # Build all apps
pnpm lint          # Code linting
pnpm format        # Code formatting

📥 Download Clients

Platform	Download Link	System Requirements
macOS	Download	macOS 12+
Windows	Download	Windows 10+
Linux	Download	Ubuntu 22.04+
Android	Download	Android 8.0+
iOS	Pending release	-

⚙️ Environment Variables

Required Configuration

# JWT Secret (at least 32 characters, generate with: openssl rand -base64 32)
JWT_SECRET=<random-string-at-least-32-characters>

# OpenAI API Key
OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-xxx...

# MySQL Database Connection
MYSQL_HOST=localhost
MYSQL_PORT=3306
MYSQL_USER=root
MYSQL_PASSWORD=your-mysql-password
MYSQL_DATABASE=aimo

Database Configuration

AIMO uses a hybrid database architecture:

• MySQL (via Drizzle ORM) - Stores all relational data (users, notes, categories, tags, etc.)
• LanceDB - Stores vector embeddings for semantic search

# MySQL Configuration (Required)
MYSQL_HOST=localhost
MYSQL_PORT=3306
MYSQL_USER=root
MYSQL_PASSWORD=your-mysql-password
MYSQL_DATABASE=aimo
MYSQL_CONNECTION_LIMIT=10

# LanceDB Configuration (Vector Storage)
LANCEDB_STORAGE_TYPE=local
LANCEDB_PATH=./lancedb_data

Attachment Storage

# Storage type: local or s3
ATTACHMENT_STORAGE_TYPE=local
ATTACHMENT_LOCAL_PATH=./attachments
ATTACHMENT_MAX_FILE_SIZE=52428800  # 50MB

For more configuration options, see .env.example

📁 Project Structure

aimo/
├── apps/
│   ├── web/              # React frontend app
│   ├── server/           # Express backend service
│   ├── client/           # Tauri desktop shell, loads the hosted site
│   └── extension/        # Browser extension
├── packages/
│   └── dto/              # Shared type definitions
├── docker-compose.yml    # Docker deployment config
└── package.json          # Root configuration

🤝 Contributing

1. Fork this repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add amazing feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feature/amazing-feature)
5. Create a Pull Request

📄 License

This project is licensed under the Business Source License 1.1 (BSL 1.1). The source is public; this is not OSI “open source”.

• ✅ Allowed: Personal use, learning, self-hosting, internal enterprise use
• ❌ Prohibited: Selling it as a competing SaaS, or offering it as a commercial hosted product
• ⏳ Change: Converts to MIT four years after publication, per BSL
• 💼 Commercial license: Contact [email protected]

📞 Contact Us

• 📧 Email: [email protected]
• 🐛 Issues: GitHub Issues
• 💬 Discussions: GitHub Discussions

---

Made with ❤️ by ximing