Use AI on selected text anywhere in Windows

Your first action, step by step

1. Select some textIn any app: a paragraph in Word, a line in Notepad, a stack trace in a terminal.
2. Press Ctrl+Shift+QSelection actions opens beside the selection, naming the app the text came from.
3. Choose an action, or type a questionPick Summarize, Rewrite, Explain, Translate or one of your own. Or type what you want and choose the Ask: … row. Typing on its own sends nothing.
4. Read the answerAn action that sends at once answers in a small popup where the menu was, with Copy, Stop and Open in SideNote to carry on in the conversation.
5. Put it back, if you wantOnce the answer is complete, *Return to app* offers Replace selection and Insert after**. Nothing goes back until you click one.

Selection actions

Ask SideNote, and custom actions set to let you review the request first, open the main window instead, with the selection waiting in the message box for your question. Every answer is saved in a new conversation in your history, like any other.

The five built-in actions

The four immediate actions carry a fixed instruction, which is what makes them fast. Rewrite asks for clearer, more polished text preserving meaning and tone. Translate preserves meaning and tone and adds no commentary. For a different instruction every time, type it into the menu and choose the Ask row, or use Ask SideNote.

Settings › Actions & prompts

Putting the answer back

Replace selection replaces only the text you selected; Insert after keeps it and adds the answer straight after it. Both paste through the editor's own paste into the document the text came from, and SideNote Pro puts your clipboard back afterwards. The row appears in the popup and under the answer in the main window, and a return is used up by its paste.

If the selection changed, the document closed or 30 minutes passed, the answer offers Copy instead and says why. Some editors, password fields, read-only text and apps running as administrator only ever offer Copy. Put the answer back where it came from has the details.

Shortcuts for the actions you use most

Every action is in the menu, so none needs a shortcut of its own. A direct shortcut skips the menu and runs one action at once, which pays off for the one or two you use many times a day.

1. Open Settings, Actions and promptsThe built-in actions are listed here with their shortcuts, beside the Selection actions shortcut itself.
2. Keep, change or clear a shortcutClearing a box removes only that shortcut. The action stays in the Selection actions menu.
3. Save and try itSelect a paragraph in any application and press the shortcut.

Settings › Actions & prompts

Every global shortcut takes precedence over the same keys inside other apps while SideNote Pro runs: Ctrl+Shift+T reopens a closed tab in most browsers, for example. If one gets in your way, change or clear it here, or pause shortcuts from the tray icon.

Custom actions are where this pays off

A custom action turns a prompt you type repeatedly into an entry in the menu, and a keystroke too if you give it one. It has four parts: an instruction, an optional shortcut, the position of {{selection}} inside the instruction, and whether it sends immediately or prepares the request for review.

The {{selection}} placeholder is what makes these flexible. Context can go before the selection, after it, or both, which matters because here is a requirement, rewrite it as acceptance criteria reads very differently to a model than the same text with no framing.

Custom actions worth building

Acceptance criteria

Rewrite this requirement as acceptance criteria in Given/When/Then form. Flag anything too vague to test: {{selection}}

Plain English

Rewrite this for a reader outside our team. No jargon, under 100 words: {{selection}}

Devil's advocate

Here is an argument. Give me the three strongest objections to it: {{selection}}

Error triage

Explain this error to someone unfamiliar with this codebase, then list the three most likely causes in order: {{selection}}

Tighten

Cut this by 40 percent without losing any substantive point: {{selection}}

Commit message

Write a concise commit message summarising this diff: {{selection}}

Use prepare for review rather than immediate send on any action where you will often want to add one sentence of context. Immediate send is right for the ones that are genuinely the same instruction every time, and those answer in the popup when you run them from the menu.

Settings › Actions & prompts › Custom actions

What this looks like across a day

Reviewing a specification

Select a paragraph, choose Explain, and see what an outside reader takes from it. If that differs from what you meant, the paragraph needs work.

Debugging

Select a stack trace in a terminal, type the one detail the trace does not contain into the menu, and choose the Ask row.

Writing

Select your own paragraph, choose Rewrite, and compare. If it reads better, Replace selection puts it in place.

Email in another language

Select, choose Translate, read, carry on.

Keeping a snippet

Select a command or an address you will need again and choose Save as Active Note. It is kept on your PC as a note, and nothing is sent.

Reading unfamiliar code

Select a function, choose Explain. Combine with local folder context when the explanation needs the rest of the codebase.

The common property is that the source application never loses focus for longer than the round trip. That is the whole point: see using AI without leaving your workflow. For text you are still writing, inline commands keep you in the field the whole time: type a trigger such as /fix, a space and your sentence, press Tab, and the result replaces it in place. The same works for translating a message while you compose it: start it with /en, write in your own language, and press Tab for English.

How capture works, and when it fails

Capture happens only when you press the Selection actions shortcut or an action's own shortcut. SideNote Pro does not poll the clipboard and does not watch for selections.

On the shortcut, it identifies the window in front, keeps a copy of your clipboard, asks that app to copy the selection, checks that the clipboard update came from it, and puts your previous clipboard back. Its own clipboard writes stay out of Windows clipboard history and cloud clipboard, so using an action does not cost you what you had copied.

If shortcuts stop responding entirely, check whether global shortcuts are paused from the tray menu. Pausing releases every binding without ending the process, stops any action that had only just begun, and the tray tooltip reports the paused state.