Note Forge was born out of a real need: as a tutor at my university, I found myself spending too much time searching for exercises, images, and references to assemble study guides for my students. With materials of varying difficulty, format, and source, the process was inefficient. Note Forge solves that.

• 🎨 Modern UX — rose, amber, and slate color palette with clean, animated UI
• 🌍 i18n support — full English and Spanish translations
• 🎮 Interactive demo — no registration, no Docker, no backend needed. Try it here

• LaTeX Editor — real-time rendering for equations, matrices, and scientific notation with syntax highlighting
• Rich Metadata — 5-level difficulty rating, duration estimates, multi-tag support, custom images, and references
• Advanced Search — filter exercises by subject, difficulty, or whether they include images

• Drag & Drop Interface — intuitive reordering with smooth animations
• Unified Workspace — three-panel layout: exercise library, guide metadata, and live preview
• Smart Metrics — automatic total time calculation (15 min/exercise) and average difficulty with visual indicators
• Export Options — save drafts and export to LaTeX (.tex) format

• Flexible Organization — subject-based categories with custom images, rich descriptions, and unlimited nesting
• Dedicated Views — hero sections with cover images, tabbed interface (exercises vs. guides), and pinnable favorite subjects

• Complete i18n with English and Spanish
• Full-featured interactive demo with pre-loaded mock data — no setup required

• Context API for global state management
• Custom React hooks for reusable logic
• Docker & Docker Compose for containerization
• GitHub Pages for demo deployment

The fastest way to explore Note Forge — no setup needed:

1. Visit xhandlr.github.io/note-forge
2. Click "Probar sin registrarse" on the landing page
3. Explore full functionality with pre-loaded mock data

The demo includes pre-configured categories, sample exercises with LaTeX, study guides with drag-and-drop, and full search capabilities.

For local development:

• ✅ Node.js v22.x+ — Download
• ✅ MySQL 8.0+ — Installation Guide
• 🐳 Docker/Podman (optional) — Get Docker
• 📦 npm or pnpm — comes with Node.js

1. Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/xhandlr/note-forge.git
cd note-forge

2. Set up the database

mysql -u root -p
source db/init.sql

3. Configure environment variables

cp note-forge-api/.env.example note-forge-api/.env
# Edit .env with your database credentials:
# DB_HOST=localhost
# DB_USER=root
# DB_PASSWORD=your_password
# DB_NAME=note_forge
# JWT_SECRET=your_secret_key

4. Start the backend

cd note-forge-api
npm install
node index.js
# API running at http://localhost:5000

5. Start the frontend

cd note-forge-ui
npm install
npm run dev
# App running at http://localhost:5173

git clone https://github.com/xhandlr/note-forge.git
cd note-forge
docker-compose up -d
# Visit http://localhost:5173

To stop:

docker-compose down

note-forge/
│
├── db/                          # Database layer
│   ├── init.sql                 # Initial schema and tables
│   └── init_test.sql            # Test schema
│
├── note-forge-api/              # Backend (Node.js + Express)
│   ├── config/                  # Database and auth configuration
│   ├── controllers/             # Request handlers
│   ├── services/                # Business logic layer
│   ├── models/                  # Data models and SQL queries
│   ├── routes/                  # API endpoint definitions
│   ├── middleware/              # JWT authentication
│   ├── .env.example             # Environment template
│   └── index.js                 # Server entry point
│
├── note-forge-ui/               # Frontend (React + TypeScript)
│   ├── public/                  # Static assets
│   └── src/
│       ├── assets/              # Images, fonts
│       ├── components/
│       │   ├── UI/              # Reusable components
│       │   └── Dashboard/       # Navbar, Footer
│       ├── contexts/            # React Context (Demo, Notifications)
│       ├── pages/               # Route-based views
│       │   ├── Auth/            # Home, Login, Registration
│       │   ├── Categories/      # Category views and forms
│       │   ├── Exercises/       # Exercise views and forms
│       │   ├── Guides/          # Guide builder workspace
│       │   ├── Dashboard/       # Main dashboard
│       │   └── Search/          # Search page
│       ├── services/            # API services
│       ├── mocks/               # Mock data for demo mode
│       └── i18n/                # EN/ES translations
│
├── docker-compose.yml
├── README.md
├── README_ES.md
└── LICENSE

This project is licensed under the MIT License.