SmartNote 2

SmartNote, a Post-it-like note-taking application for Windows 98, was the first software I released to the world, as freeware. It was motivated by a competition (organized by “Info Exame” magazine), which I won, though I’m afraid no proof of this victory remains. In any case, it led me to create a second, much better, version – SmartNote 2. It had thousands of users, who would sometimes write to me with suggestions and doubts.

The application resides as an icon in Window’s system tray, from which the user can control his or her notes. When visible, notes just float on the user’s desktop, as if they were real Post-it notes stuck to the screen. They can also be selectively hidden. Some further features illustrated by the images displayed:

• An advanced alarm system, including yearly, monthly, daily and intra-day notifications. The alarm sound can also be customized.
• Notes can be set to shutdown or restart the computer, as well as to run some specific application.
• Notes can have different importance levels and categories, for easier search and organization.
• Note search by key-word, importance, category or behavior.
• A single “physical note” can be used to display the contents of several notes sequentially over time (e.g., from the same category). This is useful to avoid cluttering the desktop while still keeping an eye on the various available notes.
• Notes can be pinned always on top of other windows.

Although this is really old, made while I was still in high school, I remain proud of it. It was developed using Visual Basic 5 at a time when I was starting to learn how to program. You can actually download the application, though I have not tested it in recent Windows versions (it worked fine at least until Windows XP).