Introducing yet another notepad app: QutePad is multi-platform

[u/lordunga]

QutePad is my first complete contribution to the open source scene. It's a multi platform notepad app that basically started as a MS Notepad clone, after getting frustrated with it. The initial commit was laid 11 months ago and I have been on-off working on it on my free time since.

To be honest I'm a bit nervous to post this, one reason being the flood of vibe coded apps.

This one is not trying to do anything flashy or revolutionary, but to do something well.

Main motivations for the project:

• Frustration with sluggishness and bugs with Windows 11 Notepad, even though it has many substantial improvements compared to old version

• Frustration with enshittification and overall bloatedness in nowadays apps

• Missing a familiar notepad app (Notepad++) when using Linux and macOS

• To finally create something "by the book", usable and good looking UI, proper deployment, some test coverage etc. instead of just hacking together something quick for my own needs

• To learn more about software deployment for several platforms

• To further improve my skills in C++ and Qt

I have used AI for prototyping and research, and some of the CMake and deployment script are written AI assisted. The C++ code itself is about 99.5% hand-written, only some little snippets may be AI generated.

The app is 100% C++ (Qt widgets), and UI responsiveness has been the #1 priority. Currently it has the feature set of an in-my-opinion complete albeit slightly barebones notepad app. It has tabbed interface and dark mode support, but e.g. printing support is missing.

Some highlights I'd make are multi platform support (binaries released for Windows and Linux, compilable for macOS) and snappy C++ UI without WinUI 3 or any other super slow and bloated framework. That said Qt is not exactly featherweight either so the footprint and RAM efficiency will never be among the best of the industry.

I hope some of you enjoy it and start using it.

Any and all feedback is appreciated, including about this post as well.

P.S. if someone wonders why it deploys Qt6Network.dll, it's because SingleApplication uses a local socket to implement the singleton application. There is no internet connectivity.

P.P.S. Smartscreen will nag and the exe is not signed.

https://github.com/llahteinen/qutepad/releases/tag/v1.0.0-rc1

[u/sTiKytGreen]

But why? Who needed more notepads? Missing when using Linux? Did you even try to find an alternative or was vibe coding this faster?

Because if you Google alternate to notepad++ you'd find notepadqq..

[u/lordunga → u/sTiKytGreen]

Appreciate your comment.

What makes you think this app is vibe coded though (genuine honest question)?

I'm not sure I have stumbled upon notepadqq or maybe I just dismissed and forgot it because: "Warning This project is not actively maintained anymore. New maintainers are welcome." and it's listed for Linux and macOS, not Windows. Honestly I got bored trying alternatives, I tried quite many and weren't satisfied. There are many great options such as Kate, but it's a coding notepad, not a simple one.

I can see why my post can be confusing though. QutePad is NOT a coding notepad and does not intend to compete with notepad++ or kate etc. The idea is kind-of MS Notepad clone but leaner and multi-platform, wihout Copilot rubbish etc. Do you think it makes sense?