Document Type

Honors Project

Publication Date

Spring 4-15-2026

Abstract

For my honors project, I’m building UMM, an advanced note-taking application built entirely from scratch. I’m someone who takes many notes and primarily uses OneNote and Notion, but over time have found myself wanting something faster and more flexible than any note-taking application I could find. UMM is my attempt to create the note-taking app I wish I had, as well as learn how to create such a program.

Instead of relying on pre-made code, I built my own systems for how documents are structured, edited, saved, as well as how the cursor moves, text is formatted, and how selections are drawn, among others. A challenging and rewarding part of the project was designing an entirely custom undo/redo system to reliably track complex changes you make.

Because the entire editor is written from scratch, UMM can support features that traditional apps struggle with, such as custom emojis, inline widgets, and workspaces that can edit local files on your own computer offline. My presentation will look at the core ideas behind UMM, the process of building it, and how doing this opens the door to new and different ways of taking notes.

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