# Notes

> One human-written line on a folder or document that tells people and AI what it is.

A note is a short line on a folder or a document that says what it is. It is the single
most useful piece of context you can add.

> Signed-off requirements from the 12 March client call. Supersedes the January draft.

## One line, two readers

The same note does two jobs:

- **People** see it in the file browser and on the document, so a teammate knows what they
  are looking at before opening it.
- **AI** receives it alongside the document whenever the document is read: by the
  assistant, and by agents over MCP. It is treated as more reliable than the model's own
  reading of the text.

There is no separate "instructions for the AI" field. What you would tell a colleague is
what steers a model well.

## Folder notes cascade

A note on a folder applies to everything inside it, at any depth. Frame a whole area once:

> Everything in here is from the 2025 engagement and is historical.

Every document below then carries that framing, together with its own note.

## Good notes

- **Say what it is and its status.** "Draft", "agreed", "superseded by V2", "meeting notes,
  unreviewed".
- **Keep it short.** Notes are capped at one line's worth of text on purpose.
- **Update it when the status changes.** Editing a note does not create a new version of
  the document; it describes the document rather than being part of it.

## Suggested notes

When Filement reads a document that has no note, it drafts one. The suggestion is
offered for you to accept or change, and Filement never writes it on its own. An
unaccepted draft isn't a note, and nothing treats it as one.

You will meet it in three places:

- **On the document**, under the title, with **Use as note** and **Edit first**.
- **On the board**, as a small ochre halo at the card's top-right corner. Right-click
  the card (or use its **⋯** menu) and choose **Add a note** to read the draft and accept
  it. A stack shows the same mark when any document in it is waiting on a note; open the
  stack and the row wearing it is the one it meant.
- **Over MCP**, as `suggestedNote` on a document in `list_folder`. It's a separate field from
  `note`, so an agent can always tell a draft from what a person wrote. An agent that
  agrees with one passes it to `set_note`.

The dot and the field both disappear the moment the item has a note of its own.

## What a note is not

A note steers; it does not enforce. "Ignore this file" makes a model far less likely to
rely on a document, but it does not hide it. Anything that must not be read belongs behind
[folder access](https://filement.app/docs/guide/workspaces-and-access.md).