TDNote - A Minimalist Note-Taking App

TDNote is a minimalist note-taking app inspired by Notion, designed to provide users with an intuitive and appealing interface. This was a project made for students of Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport (now it's also available to everyone).

Getting Started

This is a project for a practical course at my university. The goal of the course is to create a project that provides real-world value and can attract users or be applied in a specific field, as long as it brings benefits. Therefore, I drew inspiration from Notion, a popular note-taking application today. The reason I chose this idea is that I aim to target students and learners, creating an app similar to Notion but with simpler functionality and a more minimalistic, user-friendly interface.

I started working on the project in early May 2024 and officially launched it to users in mid-June. My initial approach to gaining users was, of course, to promote the product within developer communities I'm a part of, such as Discord. Just like that, because I don't have a budget for marketing, I have to rely on word of mouth and organic growth.

Surprisingly, within the first week after the launch, the app gained over 100 users and received positive feedback regarding its visually appealing and user-friendly interface. However, there were also some users who expressed the need for additional features.

Finally, I officially tested the app with students from my university. They mentioned that TDNote is very easy to use, and in particular, the animations and smooth performance of the application captivated them.

Target

• Students and learners
• People who want to take notes
• People who want to organize their work

Team

• Thanh Dat Nguyen
• Individual project

Responsibilities

• Full-stack development
• UI/UX design
• Animation design
• Sounds design
• Marketing

App Interface

Homepage of the TDNote app with a minimalist and user-friendly interface:

You can add multiple notes with different colors, making it easier to organize your work:

You can take notes just like Notion, of course, with more fun stickers:

The AI of TDNote called Joi, you can ask Joi anything about your notes:

Preview

How Joi AI Works in TDNote

Joi, the AI assistant in TDNote, combines the power of vector-based searches and advanced AI models to provide intelligent and precise responses. It utilizes Pinecone, a high-performance vector database, to analyze your notes and retrieve the most relevant content. The retrieved data is processed by OpenAI's GPT-3.5-turbo model to generate contextually accurate responses, making your note-taking experience smarter and more efficient.

Ideas for TDNote 2.0

After reviewing the feedback from users, I decided to start working on the next version of TDNote. The main goal of this version is to improve the user experience and add new features to make the app more useful.

Make AI Joi more intelligent and helpful, the first version Joi still not available to all users due to cost, but I will make it become pay to use feature in the next version.

Add more features like colaboration, sharing notes, and more fun stickers.

But I'm not intend to make TDNote 2.0, because it's just a project for a course and I have to invest my time in other projects that's more professional. But the main reason is that I want to keep it because it's a memory of my university time ❤️.

The Results

Although it is still just an experimental product, it has achieved some initial success. It has shown me how to build a product that attracts users and allowed me to learn many new technologies, especially how to integrate AI into the application.

Facing many challenges during the development process, in the end, it brought me joy to see users creating accounts, making notes, and giving both positive feedback and helpful suggestions to improve the app further.

Thank you.

In the numbers

• Over 200 users in the first month of launch
• $0 Spent on ads or promotion
• 87% of visitors create an account
• 789 notes created

Questions for Reflection

• How might the minimalist design approach of TDNote influence other note-taking applications?
• What role does AI integration play in enhancing the user experience of productivity tools?
• How can the balance between simplicity and functionality be maintained as more features are added?
• What challenges might arise when scaling a personal project to accommodate a growing user base?
• How important is user feedback in the early stages of product development?

Visit the Project

You can visit the TDNote website here.