Vaults

A vault is a folder on disk containing your notes, and (usually) a git repository. Mahfouz doesn’t create a vault for you on first launch — use File → Open Vault… (Cmd/Ctrl+O) to point it at an existing folder or an empty one you want to turn into a vault. An empty folder stays empty: Mahfouz writes no starter note into it.

The welcome page

Until you open a vault, Mahfouz shows a welcome page: a note that tours the main features, with a bar above it holding Open or create a vault… (and, on the web, Open a GitHub repository…). The welcome page is a sandbox: you can type in it, tick its checkboxes and try the formatting toolbar, but nothing on it is saved. Reloading resets it, and opening a vault replaces it.

You can have multiple vaults open at once. Each appears as its own collapsible section at the top of the Sidebar’s Notes view, showing either the connected repo’s owner/repo name (with a cloud icon) or the local folder name (with a computer icon) if it isn’t connected to a remote yet. Click a vault section’s gear/⋯ button to open Vault Settings for that vault specifically (see Git sync & remotes and Git LFS below), including:

• Vault path — shown with buttons to reveal it in Finder/Explorer, or Move or rename… it (type a new path, or pick a new parent folder; same-disk moves only).
• Rebuild from vault — wipes and rebuilds the local index from the files on disk. Use this if the sidebar or search ever looks out of sync with what’s actually in the folder.
• Remove vault from Mahfouz — removes it from the app only; nothing on disk is touched.

On the web, vaults open differently: see Mahfouz on the web.