Desktop App
The desktop app is a native application for macOS, Windows and Linux. It talks to the same server as the web app and syncs the same workspaces, and it is the version that puts your files on your own disk.
What's different on desktop
- A real folder on your disk. Every workspace you belong to is mirrored to a folder on your machine as plain text. Open it in your file browser, read it in your editor, grep it from the terminal, point a script or your own assistant at it. The mirror is one-way: General Text writes it, and anything else that writes there is overwritten the next time the workspace changes. To write into a workspace from outside the app, use the
gtcommand line (see Agent Access), which goes through the same encrypted, versioned, synced path as an edit in the app. - Real-time sync, and offline. Files sync live over the same engine as the web app, not a periodic poll, and keep working with no connection. Edits you make offline reconcile when you reconnect.
- The same interface. Editing, apps and collaboration work exactly as they do on the web.
- Back and Forward. The History menu steps back (
Cmd/Ctrl+[) and forward (Cmd/Ctrl+]) through where you've been; on macOS a two-finger swipe does the same. - Local agent access. An opt-in loopback bridge for scripts and agents running on this machine. See Agent Access.
Signing in
The app signs you in through your browser, always: press Sign in in your browser, finish on the page that opens, and this window signs in on its own. That is where your password manager, autofill and Google work, and it means a password is only ever typed in the browser. If nothing opens, the screen offers a retry. Creating an account happens on the web too.
Once you're in, the app opens Workspaces Home, an overview of every workspace you belong to and what you last had open, with the same workspaces in the switcher at the top of the sidebar. There is no signed-out mode: your files are encrypted to your identity, so the app asks you to sign in rather than showing an emptied-out version of your workspaces.
The session lasts a year, so this is rare after the first time.
Where the folder is
Each workspace mirrors to {your General Text folder}/{workspace name}. The root is in Settings → You → Storage, and one workspace can be pointed somewhere else in Settings → Workspace → Folder (per device). Deleting or leaving a workspace leaves its folder where it is, so what you had locally stays readable.
Sync behavior
The sync line at the bottom of the sidebar shows the connection state. Every synced workspace is mirrored in the background, not only the one you have open: the app sweeps through them while it runs, so your local folders stay complete without you visiting each workspace.
On your phone
There's no separate app-store download for phones and tablets. Add General Text to your home screen from your mobile browser and it runs full-screen from its own icon. See Mobile App.