Stash

Obsidian for your content. Save anything from the web — articles, videos, links — and have it automatically organized, summarized, and searchable. One click. No friction.

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What it does

• One-click save from any browser — Chrome, Arc, Brave, Edge, Firefox, Safari
• AI enrichment — every save gets a summary, tags, and a topic label automatically (Claude Haiku)
• YouTube transcripts — saves the full spoken transcript, not page noise
• Hybrid search — keyword + semantic so you find things by meaning, not just exact words
• Native desktop library — a fast, clean Tauri app that lives in your dock

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Stack

Layer	Tech
Capture	MV3 browser extension · Safari Web Extension
Backend	Python · FastAPI · SQLite
AI	Claude Haiku 4.5 · fastembed (local embeddings)
Search	SQLite FTS5 + cosine similarity hybrid
Desktop	Tauri · React · TypeScript · Tailwind CSS

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Using Stash

Stash ships as a single desktop app — no terminal, no config files.

1. Launch Stash. The app starts its local engine automatically.
2. On first run you're asked for your Anthropic API key (get one here).
3. The key is verified, then stored in your OS keychain — it never leaves your device except to call Anthropic. You only pay Anthropic for what you use; there's no Stash subscription.
4. Install the browser extension and start saving.

You can replace or remove your key any time from Settings, along with re-running enrichment and rebuilding the search index.

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Development setup

1. Backend

cd backend
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

For local dev you can put a key in backend/.env (gitignored) so the engine is pre-configured:

ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-...

Otherwise, just launch the desktop app and enter the key in the onboarding screen — it's pushed to the backend at runtime via POST /config/api-key.

Run it directly during development:

uvicorn main:app --reload --port 8000

2. Browser extension

Chrome / Arc / Brave / Edge / Firefox:

1. Go to your browser's extensions page (chrome://extensions or about:debugging)
2. Enable Developer mode
3. Load unpacked → select the extension/ folder
4. Click the Stash icon on any page, or press Cmd+Shift+S

Safari:

1. Open Stash/Stash.xcodeproj in Xcode
2. Run the Stash (macOS) scheme (Cmd+R)
3. Safari → Settings → Extensions → enable Stash
4. Click the toolbar icon or press Cmd+Shift+S

3. Desktop app

Requires Rust.

cd desktop
npm install
npm run tauri:dev   # native desktop app
# or: npm run dev   # browser preview at localhost:5173

Building a shippable app

The Python backend is bundled into the app as a Tauri sidecar so end users never run uvicorn themselves. Build the sidecar binary, then the app:

cd desktop
npm run build:backend   # PyInstaller → src-tauri/binaries/stash-backend-<target-triple>
npm run tauri:build     # produces the distributable .app / installer

tauri:build runs build:backend automatically. At runtime the app spawns the sidecar, points its SQLite DB at the per-user app-data directory (STASH_DATA_DIR), and shuts it down on quit. Installers land in desktop/src-tauri/target/release/bundle/.

The sidecar is platform-specific — it can't be cross-compiled. Build on each OS/arch you want to ship.

Releasing to users

Releases are published to GitHub Releases via CI (.github/workflows/release.yml). Each runner builds its own sidecar, then tauri build, and uploads the installers:

git tag v0.1.0
git push origin v0.1.0   # → builds macOS arm64 + Intel, creates a draft Release

Users then download the .dmg for their Mac from the Releases page.

Signing: the workflow ships unsigned by default (macOS users right-click → Open the first time). For a Gatekeeper-clean release, add an Apple Developer ID cert and set the APPLE_* repo secrets referenced in the workflow to enable notarization. Add the Windows/Linux matrix entries (commented in the workflow) to ship those platforms too.

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Saving

Three ways to save anything, all instant:

Action	Result
Click the toolbar icon	Saves the current page
Cmd+Shift+S	Saves from anywhere on the page
Right-click	Save page · Save selection · Save link

A toast confirms each save. Claude enriches it in the background — no waiting at capture time.

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Search

Type anything in the desktop app search bar. It combines:

• Keyword (FTS5 full-text across titles, summaries, tags, transcripts)
• Semantic (local embeddings — finds related content without exact word matches)

To index existing saves: POST http://localhost:8000/embed-pending

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Project layout

stash/
  backend/     FastAPI + SQLite brain
  extension/   MV3 extension (Chrome, Arc, Brave, Edge, Firefox)
  Stash/       Safari Web Extension (Xcode)
  desktop/     Tauri + React library UI

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License

MIT