Editing Markdown files in place
Some Markdown lives outside your notes: a README in a Git repository, a file in iCloud Drive, notes a colleague sent you. Varlig can edit those files where they are, without copying them into your library.
Open a file
Choose File › Open Markdown File… (⌥⌘O), or open the file from Finder with Open With ▸
Varlig, or run open -a Varlig notes.md in Terminal. Varlig opens .md, .markdown, .txt and
similar plain-text files, up to 32 MB.
A file window looks like the editor you know, with a FILE badge, the file’s name, its folder and its save state in the header. The folder button reveals it in Finder.
Open a folder
Choose File › Open Folder… (⌃⌘O), drop a folder on Varlig’s icon in the Dock, or run
open -a Varlig ~/Projects/handbook in Terminal. A folder window lists the folder’s Markdown and
text files in a sidebar, grouped by subfolder, and edits the one you choose in the same editor as a
file window. It opens on the README if there is one, and returns to the file you last read.
The list follows the folder as it changes: files that another app or a git checkout adds, removes
or renames appear and disappear on their own. Hidden folders such as .git, and node_modules, are
left out. Filter files narrows the list by name or path, and + makes a new, empty
Untitled.md beside the file you’re reading. Choosing another file saves the one you leave, and a
relative link to a file in the same folder opens it in the same window.
Varlig writes nothing into the folder but your own files — no database and no hidden settings — so it stays exactly as portable as it was.
Saving
Edits save themselves about a second after you stop typing, and File › Save (⌘S) saves immediately. The header shows Saved, Edited, or Save failed with the reason.
Varlig writes the file the way it found it: the same line endings, the same byte-order mark, and a final newline only if it had one. Writes are atomic and keep the file’s permissions, so a file tracked by Git shows a clean, minimal diff.
File › Save As… writes a copy somewhere else and keeps editing that copy.
Pictures and links beside the file
Relative references work from the file’s own folder, so  and
[the plan](plan.md) open what you’d expect, up to three folders above the file. A picture you
paste or drop in is saved next to the file in a folder named after it, such as notes.assets/.
Tags and [[note links]] are ordinary text in a file window: they belong to your library, and a
file on disk has nowhere to keep them.
When the file changes on disk
If something else changes the file while you have unsaved edits — a git pull, a sync client,
another editor — Varlig keeps both versions and says so:
- Compare… shows the two side by side, marking what is only on disk and what is only in your window.
- Keep Mine saves your version and keeps the disk version as a dated copy beside the file.
- Use Disk Version shows the disk version and keeps yours as a dated copy beside the file.
Nothing is overwritten either way, and the copies are named so you can tell them apart, such as
notes (disk version 2026-09-22 1415).md.
If the file is deleted or moved while you’re editing, Varlig tells you and offers Save As…, so your text is never stranded.
Answer formats stay with the file
A line’s answer format — decimal places, separators, notation — and its Subtotal or Time Point setting are kept in the file’s metadata, an extended attribute, rather than written into the Markdown. The text stays exactly yours, and the next time you open the file, in a file window or a folder window, each line looks as you left it. Lines you edit, insert or move keep their settings, and a line whose text is gone loses its settings rather than passing them to another.
Some tools don’t keep extended attributes: Git, most zip tools, some sync services and disks formatted for Windows. The formats then fall back to your defaults, and the text is unaffected. To keep Varlig out of the file’s metadata altogether, turn off Remember answer formats in Markdown files in Settings › Editor. It’s on to begin with.
What’s different in a file window
- No version history, no note password and no backups: the file on disk is the only copy.
- Calculation blocks work as usual. An answer format or line setting you choose for one line is kept with the file, as above, not in its text.
varlig://links navigate to a note; they never run automation from a file.