Igneous

Support

Help, in plain text.

Igneous is a Markdown notes app for Mac, iPhone and iPad. Your notes are ordinary .md files in a folder you choose, and the app reads and writes that folder directly, so anything else that edits Markdown can edit them too.

What you need

  • A Mac with macOS 14 Sonoma or later, with Apple silicon or an Intel processor.
  • An iPhone with iOS 17 or later, or an iPad with iPadOS 17 or later.
  • To sync, the Mac and the phone on the same network, or joined by a VPN.

Igneous for Mac is a direct download rather than a Mac App Store app. The iPhone and iPad app comes from the App Store.

Where your notes are

  • On the Mac, a notebook is any folder you choose. The first time Igneous opens, it makes one called Igneous Vault in your Documents folder, with a short guided tour in it.
  • On iPhone and iPad, the first notebook is inside the app, and the Files app shows it under On My iPhone (or On My iPad) ▸ Igneous. You can add any other folder Files can reach, iCloud Drive included, with Add Folder from Files… under Settings ▸ General & Vaults ▸ Notebooks.
  • A notebook synced from a Mac is kept on the phone as an offline copy, inside the app, and works without a connection.

Igneous's own settings stay on each device. On the Mac they are in ~/Library/Application Support/Igneous/, and the pairing code is in the Keychain.

Pairing a phone with your Mac

Sync runs directly between your devices over your own network, with no account and no cloud service in between. On the Mac:

  1. Open Igneous ▸ Settings ▸ Web Server and turn on Run web server.
  2. Set Address to Local network. A phone cannot reach “This Mac only”.
  3. Under Pairing Code, find the eight-character code, shown as XXXX-XXXX. If there is none yet, choose Create Code.

Then on the iPhone or iPad:

  1. Open Settings ▸ General & Vaults and tap your notebook under Notebooks, then tap Connect to a Mac….
  2. Allow Igneous to find devices on your local network when it asks.
  3. Choose your Mac under Macs on this network, type the pairing code — capitals and the dash don't matter — and tap Connect.

If your Mac doesn't appear

Check that the server is running and set to Local network, and that both devices are on the same Wi-Fi. If it still doesn't appear, or you are connecting over a VPN, type the Mac's .local name or its IP address in Or type an address — the address is shown under Status on the Mac. Add the port only if you changed it from 8080, as in 192.168.1.20:9876. Other names for the Mac, such as one a VPN gives it, are refused; use its IP address on that network instead.

If a phone is lost

Choose New Code on the Mac. Every phone and browser using the old code is signed out at once; pair the ones you still have again with the new code. After ten wrong codes in a minute, the Mac refuses every code, right or wrong, for the next minute.

In a web browser

With the server running, open the address shown under Status in a browser on the same network and enter the same code. The browser asks once and remembers it.

Syncing away from home

Your Mac and your phone find each other only on the same network, and sync itself isn't encrypted. To sync from anywhere, or on Wi-Fi you don't trust, connect them through Tailscale: a private network that encrypts everything between your own devices. Any VPN that reaches your Mac works the same way.

  1. Install Tailscale on your Mac and on your iPhone or iPad, and sign in to the same account on both.
  2. On the Mac, turn on the server as in Pairing a phone with your Mac, with Address set to Local network.
  3. In Tailscale on the Mac, copy the Mac's Tailscale address. It starts with 100.
  4. On the phone, with Tailscale on, open Connect to a Mac…, type that address in Or type an address, as in 100.101.102.103, then enter the pairing code and tap Connect. Add the port only if you changed it from 8080.

Type the address, not the Mac's Tailscale name (such as my-mac.tail1234.ts.net). Igneous refuses names it can't confirm are its own, which is what stops a malicious web page from reaching your notes.

Two things to know

  • Your Mac has to be awake, with Igneous open. A sleeping Mac can't be reached from anywhere. To keep it awake, turn on Prevent automatic sleeping when the display is off in System Settings ▸ Energy, or on a laptop in System Settings ▸ Battery ▸ Options, where it applies while it's on power.
  • Your phone syncs while Igneous is open. It catches up each time you open it, and keeps up while you use it.

Sending a diagnostics report

If something goes wrong, a diagnostics report helps us see why. On the Mac, choose Help ▸ Copy Diagnostics. On iPhone or iPad, open Settings ▸ System and tap Copy Diagnostics. The report goes onto the clipboard: read it if you like, then paste it into your message. Igneous never sends it anywhere itself — see Privacy.

Contact

Email support@getigneous.com. Say which device and which system version you are using, and paste the diagnostics report if you have one.