SideNote Pro

Frequently asked questions

Answers taken from what SideNote Pro actually does, including the places where the honest answer is no. If yours is not here, get in touch.

About SideNote Pro

What is SideNote Pro?
SideNote Pro is a compact native Windows AI assistant that stays close to your work. It can be summoned from anywhere with a global shortcut, kept above other windows, docked to the right edge of the screen, or retracted into a slim drawer leash. It uses a bring-your-own-key model, so you connect it to an AI provider you choose with your own API key.
What does SideNote Pro do?
It answers questions, and it accepts more than typed prompts: you can attach PDF, DOCX, TXT and Markdown documents, send screenshots and images, index a local folder and ask questions about its contents, and run AI actions on text selected in any Windows application. Responses render as Markdown with copyable code, can be exported to PDF, and are saved to a local conversation history you can search.
Is SideNote Pro a Windows AI assistant?
Yes. It is a native Windows application built with WinUI 3 on the Windows App SDK, running on .NET and shipped self-contained. It is not a web application in a desktop wrapper.
Which versions of Windows does SideNote Pro support?
Currently Windows 11 x64. There is no macOS, Linux, ARM64, mobile or web build.
Is SideNote Pro a sidebar?
It can be. The optional right-edge drawer anchors the assistant to the edge of your current display and retracts it into a small 44 by 68 pixel leash when you are not using it. Clicking the leash restores the size and vertical position you left. It can also be used as an ordinary floating window.
Can SideNote Pro stay on top of other windows?
Yes. Always-on-top is available for the assistant window, and the drawer leash can stay on top independently without forcing the expanded window to be topmost.
Does SideNote Pro start with Windows?
It can, and this is enabled by default. Registration uses the per-user Windows Run key, so no administrator rights are needed. A sign-in launch is silent: the assistant window never appears and never takes focus, and only the drawer leash or the tray icon is shown.
Does SideNote Pro work across multiple monitors?
Yes. The window is per-monitor DPI aware, capture uses physical coordinates so it works across displays and negative virtual-desktop positions, and the drawer leash re-docks itself when Windows reports a resolution change, a work-area change, a DPI change or a display disconnect.
What is the global shortcut?
Ctrl+Shift+Space by default. It works from any application in Windows.
Can I change the shortcut?
Yes, in Settings under Keyboard. It accepts modifiers combined with Space, a letter or a number, such as Alt+Space or Ctrl+Shift+J. If Windows refuses to register a combination because another application holds it, SideNote Pro tells you and restores the previous working shortcut.

Bring your own key

What does BYOK mean?
Bring your own key means the application uses AI credentials you supply, for a provider you chose, rather than bundling AI usage into its own licence. SideNote Pro ships with no AI credentials and no endpoint of its own, so requests go from your machine directly to the provider you configure.
Does SideNote Pro include AI usage?
No. The licence covers the Windows application only. AI usage is billed by your provider, under that provider's own pricing and terms, for what you actually use.
Can I use my own OpenAI API key?
Yes. Add a provider profile from the OpenAI preset, which uses the base URL https://api.openai.com/v1, and enter your own secret key. The key is encrypted for your Windows account and is never written into settings.json.
Can I use Ollama?
Yes. Ollama exposes an OpenAI-compatible interface, and SideNote Pro has an Ollama preset that starts from http://localhost:11434/v1. You install and run Ollama yourself; SideNote Pro does not supply the model.
Can I use LM Studio?
Yes. There is an LM Studio preset that starts from http://localhost:1234/v1. The LM Studio local server needs to be running with a model loaded.
Can I use another OpenAI-compatible provider?
Yes. Add a custom profile with the provider's base URL, an API key if it requires one, and a model ID. SideNote Pro expects bearer-token authentication, GET {BaseUrl}/models for testing and discovery, and streaming POST {BaseUrl}/chat/completions using Server-Sent Events terminated by [DONE].
Can I configure more than one provider?
Yes. You can keep as many local provider profiles as you like, each with its own base URL, credentials, model and reasoning setting. One is marked as the default, and you switch between them from the picker in the composer.
Can I change models?
Yes. Model is a per-profile field. Where your endpoint supports model discovery, the available IDs fill a searchable picker; where it does not, you type the model ID by hand.
Where do I get an API key?
From your AI provider. For OpenAI, that is the developer platform, which is separate from a consumer ChatGPT subscription. Local providers such as Ollama and LM Studio usually need no key at all.
Does SideNote Pro store my API key?
Yes, locally and protected. Each provider profile has its own credential file under %LOCALAPPDATA%\SideNote Pro\provider-credentials\, protected with Windows DPAPI and bound to your Windows user account. Keys are never written into settings.json.
Does BediniLabs receive my API key?
No. Your key never leaves your machine except in requests to the provider endpoint you configured. The BediniLabs licensing service handles activation and entitlement only, and your AI requests do not pass through it.
Do I pay the AI provider separately?
Yes. That is what bring your own key means. The application licence and your AI usage are separate: you pay your provider for inference according to their pricing. If you use a local model on your own hardware, there is no per-request charge at all.
Is BYOK cheaper?
It depends entirely on your usage. Metered billing costs nothing in a quiet month and scales up in a busy one, so light or bursty use is usually cheaper than a flat subscription while heavy daily use of an expensive model can be more expensive. Cost depends on the provider, the model, reasoning effort, context size and how much you send.

Models and reasoning

Which AI model does SideNote Pro use by default?
A new OpenAI provider profile starts on gpt-5-mini. That is a starting point rather than a restriction: the model is fully configurable per profile.
Can I use a different model?
Yes. Any model your configured provider offers, selected from the discovered list or entered by hand.
Does SideNote Pro discover models automatically?
Where your provider supports it. The connection test calls GET {BaseUrl}/models, and any model IDs it returns populate a searchable picker. Not every compatible endpoint implements that route.
Can I type a model ID manually?
Yes. Manual model entry is always available, so a provider without a models route works exactly the same as one with it.
What is reasoning effort?
Some models can be told how much internal reasoning to do before answering. SideNote Pro can send the OpenAI-compatible reasoning_effort field per provider profile, with options for Provider default, None, Minimal, Low, Medium, High, Extra high and Maximum. Provider default omits the field entirely and is the most compatible choice.
Is higher reasoning always better?
No. Higher reasoning generates more tokens before you see an answer, so it is slower and costs more. It helps on problems where the answer depends on connecting several things correctly, such as debugging from evidence or reviewing a design for failure modes. On rewriting, summarizing or translating, it produces the same answer more slowly.
How can I get faster responses?
Use a smaller model for light tasks, keep reasoning effort low where it is not needed, ask for shorter answers, start new threads instead of carrying long context, and remove attachments you have finished with. Provider latency and, for local models, your own hardware also matter.
Does reasoning effort affect API usage?
Yes. Internal reasoning consumes generated tokens, which your provider bills. That is why leaving everything on a high setting is a real cost rather than a free safety margin.
Why might a smaller or faster model be better for everyday work?
Because most everyday requests have no hidden structure to work out. Rewriting a paragraph, summarizing an email or generating heading options need fluency, not deliberation, and a smaller model does them faster and cheaper with no visible loss in quality.
How do I choose a model for coding?
Split by what the question needs. Asking what a function does or what a syntax is are comprehension tasks that a mid-range model handles well. Working out why something deadlocks under load, or whether a migration is safe with concurrent writes, is a reasoning task where a more capable model and higher reasoning effort earn their cost.
How do I choose a model for writing?
Drafting and rewriting are fluency tasks, and small fast models are strikingly good at them. A more capable model helps with structure rather than sentences: organising a long argument, spotting a contradiction, or identifying which section is doing no work.

Privacy

Are my conversations uploaded to SideNote Pro servers?
No. There is no SideNote Pro conversation backend, no cloud storage of your threads and no synchronisation. Conversations are stored on your device. The requests you submit go to the AI provider you configured, and that provider applies its own policies.
Where are conversations stored?
Locally, in a conversation archive under %LOCALAPPDATA%\SideNote Pro\. History can be disabled, given a retention period, encrypted for your Windows account, or deleted entirely.
Where is my API key stored?
In a per-profile credential file under %LOCALAPPDATA%\SideNote Pro\provider-credentials\, protected with Windows DPAPI for your current Windows account. Keys are never written into settings.json.
Does SideNote Pro collect telemetry?
No. There is no telemetry, no usage pings and no crash beacons.
Does SideNote Pro have analytics?
No product analytics of any kind, and no advertising.
Does SideNote Pro record my screen?
No. There is no background capture, no periodic screenshotting and no ambient screen awareness. A screenshot exists only because you started one, and it is sent only when you submit the message it is attached to.
Does SideNote Pro continuously monitor the clipboard?
No. There is no clipboard polling. A clipboard image is read when you press Ctrl+V, and a selection is captured when you press an action shortcut. Nothing else reads the clipboard.
When does SideNote Pro capture selected text?
Only when you press a shortcut you assigned to a selected-text action. It identifies the active window, preserves your existing clipboard, sends a native copy to that application, and restores your previous clipboard afterwards.
What information is sent to my AI provider?
When you submit a request: your prompt and the system prompt, recent conversation context and the compaction summary when one exists, any text captured by a selected-text action, text extracted locally from attached documents, image data from attachments and screenshots, and any folder excerpts local retrieval selected. Nothing is sent before you submit.
What does BediniLabs receive?
Licensing and device information needed for trial authorization, activation, entitlement refresh and device deactivation. Not prompts, responses, attachments, screenshots, filenames, folder contents, usage figures or your provider API key.
Can I protect conversation history?
Yes. Optional encryption applies Windows DPAPI to the conversation archive, including extracted document contents, binding it to your current Windows account. It is local at-rest protection rather than a portable password-based format.
Can I delete my history?
Yes. Individual threads can be deleted with confirmation, a retention period can delete inactive threads automatically, and there is a permanent delete-all action in Settings.
Can I use a local AI provider?
Yes, through Ollama or LM Studio. With a local provider the request goes to localhost and inference runs on your own hardware, which is the only configuration where nothing leaves the machine. SideNote Pro does not supply the local model and cannot make guarantees about third-party software.

Documents and folders

Can SideNote Pro read PDFs?
Yes. PDF text is extracted locally and page markers are preserved, so a response can attribute a point to a page. There is no OCR, so scanned or image-only PDFs are rejected with a clear message rather than sent as empty documents.
Can SideNote Pro use Word documents?
Yes. DOCX text, lists and tables are extracted locally without running macros, loading external resources or pulling in embedded objects. TXT and Markdown files are also supported.
Does SideNote Pro upload my original document?
No. The original file is never uploaded. Text is extracted on your machine, and only that extracted text is included in the request when you press Send.
Can SideNote Pro read scanned PDFs?
No. There is no OCR, so a scanned or image-only PDF contains no extractable text. You can attach the page as an image instead and use a model that supports image input.
Can I ask SideNote Pro about a local folder?
Yes. You explicitly add a folder, SideNote Pro indexes it locally, and when you ask a question, local search selects the relevant excerpts to include in the request. Responses keep a Sources list identifying the files and PDF pages the excerpts came from.
Does SideNote Pro index my entire computer?
No. Folders are added explicitly by you. There is no drive crawling, no recent-files inspection and no automatic discovery of any kind.
Does SideNote Pro use embeddings?
No. Folder search uses deterministic BM25-style lexical ranking over excerpt text and relative filenames. No embeddings are computed and no embedding service is contacted.
Does SideNote Pro use a vector database?
No. There is no vector database and no hosted search. Indexing, storage, querying and ranking all happen locally, and folder indexes are protected with Windows DPAPI.
Does SideNote Pro watch folders in the background?
No. There is no filesystem watcher. An index reflects the last time it was built, and you refresh it when you want it updated.
Which folder excerpts are sent to the AI?
Only the excerpts local search selected: up to ten high-ranked passages that fit the remaining context budget, clearly delimited as untrusted reference material. Folder-wide context is never sent, so a large folder does not become a large prompt.
Can I see which files were used?
Yes. Each folder-assisted response carries a Sources expander listing the folder, the relative file path and the PDF page for each excerpt supplied, with Open and Reveal actions when the file is still available. It survives reopening the conversation.

Screenshots and images

Can I send screenshots to AI?
Yes. SideNote Pro has native screen capture built in, and captured images are attached to your next message.
Can I capture a region?
Yes. Region capture hides SideNote Pro, shows the desktop as a backdrop with a translucent selection overlay, and lets you drag out the area you want. Esc or a right-click cancels.
Can I capture the active window?
Yes. Active-window capture uses the window that was in front before you summoned SideNote Pro, so it captures what you were looking at rather than the assistant itself.
Can I capture another monitor?
Yes. Current-screen capture takes the full pixel bounds of a monitor, and entire-desktop capture takes the whole Windows virtual desktop across every display. Capture uses physical coordinates, so multiple displays work correctly.
Can I paste an image from the clipboard?
Yes. Ctrl+V attaches a bitmap when the clipboard holds one. You can also drag an image file onto the window or use the image picker, which accepts PNG, JPEG or JPG, and WebP. Up to five images per request.
Does screenshot capture happen automatically?
No. Capture happens only when you start it. There is no background capture and no ambient screen monitoring. Protected or DRM-restricted content may capture as blank because Windows blocks it.
Does my model need image support?
Yes. Image understanding is a model capability, not an application one. SideNote Pro sends images in the OpenAI-compatible multimodal shape, but a text-only model will ignore or reject them. This catches people most often on local providers, where many small models are text-only.

Conversations

Does SideNote Pro save conversation history?
Yes, locally. A saved thread keeps its messages, attachments and extracted document contents, folder source provenance, the provider and model recorded per response, its pinned state, your unsent draft and your scroll position.
Can history be disabled?
Yes, in Settings under History and context. You can also set a retention period that deletes inactive threads after a number of days, where a value of 0 keeps history indefinitely.
Can I search conversations?
Yes. The history flyout offers full-text search across both titles and message content, with groups for Pinned, Today, Yesterday, Previous 7 days and Older.
Can I pin conversations?
Yes. Pinned threads appear in their own group and are exempt from automatic retention pruning.
Can I export conversations?
Yes. Any thread can be exported to a Markdown file from the history flyout. Document attachments are listed by name rather than having their extracted bodies included.
Can I regenerate an answer?
Yes. The latest assistant response can be regenerated.
Can I continue a stopped response?
Yes. Stopping a response keeps what has arrived so far as a partial answer, and that partial response can be continued rather than restarted.
Can I edit and resend an earlier message?
Yes. A user message can be edited and resent. Later messages in that branch are replaced after a confirmation, so the thread stays coherent.
What happens when a conversation becomes too long?
SideNote Pro compacts it. At least the eight most recent messages are kept intact, the configured model is asked to summarize the older context, and that summary is carried into later requests. Every original message stays in your local history.
What is context compaction?
It is the mechanism that keeps a long conversation inside the model context budget, which defaults to 24,000 estimated tokens and is adjustable from 4,000 to 500,000. Compaction is a real provider request, so it consumes tokens and adds latency; it reduces what is sent to later requests without altering your local archive.

Export

Can I export an AI response to PDF?
Yes. Every settled assistant response has a Save as PDF action. It exports that one response, not the conversation, as an A4 document with real selectable text, rendered locally with no upload and nothing added to usage accounting.
Can I copy responses?
Yes. Both user and assistant messages have copy actions, and a successful copy briefly confirms itself in the icon and tooltip.
Can I copy code separately?
Yes. Fenced code blocks have their own copy action, so you can take just the code without stripping prose out of the paste.
Can I export a conversation to Markdown?
Yes, from the history flyout. That is the whole-conversation export. PDF export is per response, so the two features cover different needs.
Does PDF export handle non-Latin text?
Not fully. Export covers Latin script by embedding a subset of the Windows Arial faces, with Consolas for code. Characters outside that repertoire are transliterated, accent-folded, or replaced with a question mark, so CJK, Arabic and emoji will not survive. Use Markdown export or copy the response for those.

Pricing and trial

How long is the free trial?
30 days. It starts only after you confirm on the first-use screen, and it is authorized by the licensing service rather than issued locally, so starting it needs an internet connection. The full assistant is available during the trial.
How much does SideNote Pro cost?
$19, once, for a lifetime licence covering the Windows application.
Is the licence a subscription?
No. It is a one-time purchase, not a recurring fee.
Is AI usage included?
No. SideNote Pro uses a bring-your-own-key model, so the licence covers the application and you pay your chosen AI provider separately for what you use. If you run a local model on your own hardware, there is no per-request charge.
What happens when my trial ends?
Sending, regenerating, continuing and editing for AI generation show a purchase prompt instead of contacting your provider. Everything else keeps working: your saved conversations, viewing, copying, exporting, Settings, purchase and activation all remain available.
Can I still access previous conversations after trial expiry?
Yes. Your conversation history stays on your device and remains viewable and searchable after the trial ends.
Can I still export content after trial expiry?
Yes. Copying, Markdown export and PDF export all remain available, because they are local operations that do not contact your provider.
Do I need a SideNote Pro account?
No. There is no account, no sign-up and no profile. Licensing works through an activation key and a device-bound entitlement rather than a user account.
Does reinstalling reset the trial?
No. The trial is tied to your Windows installation rather than to the application folder, so reinstalling resumes the original trial period.

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