Sharing a note

Sending one note to someone else.

TODO — this page is written, but do not publish it yet.

Sharing is built and working in the extension: a sticky’s ⋯ menu creates a link, and opening a share link redirects the recipient to the source page and drops the note onto it. Everything described below was checked against the extension’s own code.

What stops it shipping is the address. API_BASE in background.js is http://localhost:8080, and the manifest’s host_permissions allows only that origin, so a share link points at a development machine and works for nobody else. The Share button on thread notes and in the dashboard’s note modal also still reads coming soon, and the MVP scope document defers sharing to v2.

So: swap the origin and finish the buttons, or cut the buttons and hold this page back. The prose is ready either way — delete this block when the first of those happens.

One thing here isn’t the extension’s to confirm: the interstitial page is server-rendered by the API, so check “What the recipient sees” against it before publishing.

Hover a sticky, open ⋯, and choose Share. Pagenail creates a link and shows it with a Copy link button.

If it fails, the menu offers a retry.

Only stickies can be shared. Thread notes have a Share button, but it reads coming soon and does nothing yet; the dashboard’s note modal is the same. To share a thread note today, Float as sticky first.

What the recipient sees

The link opens a Pagenail page that shows the note, says which page it came from, and links to it.

Without Pagenail installed, that page is the whole experience: they read the note where it is, follow the link to the source page if they want it, and are offered the extension. Nothing is added to their browser.

With Pagenail installed, the page is a way station. Pagenail recognises it and, after a couple of seconds, forwards them to the page the note was written on. A small Opening in 2s… Cancel banner shows during the pause, so they can stop the redirect and stay where they are.

On arrival, the note appears on the page as a floating card, flashing once so it’s easy to find. It looks deliberately unlike their own notes: blue rather than amber, labelled Shared by whoever sent it — or just Shared note — and read-only. They can copy it, keep it, or dismiss it, but not edit it. If the card doesn’t fit their window it collapses to a marker on the right edge, labelled Shared note, exactly as their own notes do.

If the fetch fails they still land on the right page, just without the note.

Shared notes are temporary unless pinned

A shared note belongs to the visit that imported it. Leave and come back and it’s gone — Pagenail clears unpinned shared notes when the page next loads.

Pin — the pushpin button on the card — is what keeps one. Pinned, it survives future visits and behaves like any other note of theirs. The tooltip says which state it’s in: Pin (keep on future visits) or Unpin (will disappear on next visit).

Two consequences worth knowing:

  • Opening the same link twice, without pinning, gives you a fresh copy of the note each time. Any dragging or resizing you did on the previous visit is gone with it.
  • A pinned shared note is recognised on a second visit and isn’t duplicated.

Sharing from the dashboard

The dashboard’s note modal has its own Share, which is different: it uses your operating system’s share sheet, or falls back to copying the note’s text and address to the clipboard. It does not create a link.