Core Concepts

This chapter explains the fundamental concepts behind Flow. Understanding these will help you get the most out of the tool.

Outliner-First

Flow is built around the idea that thinking happens in outlines. Instead of starting with a blank page, you start with bullet points that can be nested, rearranged, and expanded.

- Project ideas
  - Flow improvements
    - Add vim keybindings
    - Implement sync server
  - Blog posts to write
    - Why outliners beat documents

Each bullet point is a discrete unit of thought that can:

• Be collapsed or expanded
• Be referenced from elsewhere
• Have properties attached
• Be queried and filtered

Object-Based Notes

Every item in Flow is an object with:

1. Content - The text you write
2. References - Links to other objects ([[like this]])
3. Tags - Classification markers (#tag)
4. Properties - Key-value metadata (status:: active)

This means your notes aren’t just text—they’re queryable data.

Knowledge Graph

All your notes form a graph of interconnected ideas:

• Nodes are your notes/bullets
• Edges are references between them
• Tags group related nodes
• Properties add structured data

You can traverse this graph, find connections, and query it like a database.

Spaces

A space is a collection of notes, typically stored in a single directory. You might have:

• A personal space for life management
• A work space for project notes
• A space per major project

Spaces are independent but can reference each other.

Local-First

Your data lives on your machine in plain Markdown files:

• No cloud dependency
• No vendor lock-in
• Version control friendly
• Readable without Flow

Sync is opt-in and self-hosted.

Continue to the next chapters to learn about each concept in detail.