_the evening, see_
A diary that keeps
its own counsel.
SoirVu is a local-first, encrypted diary. Your entries are encrypted and live in a vault on your own machine.
macOS · Linux · Windows — free and open source (MIT)
Watch it work
A short walkthrough: entries, attachments, search, lock. 70 seconds.
What it does
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Encrypted vault
Entries live in a SQLCipher database; attachments are stored as separately encrypted files. Keys are derived with Argon2id and wrapped in LUKS-style key slots — changing your passphrase never re-encrypts your diary.
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Recovery key
A randomly generated key, shown once at setup, lets you back in if the passphrase is forgotten. If you lose both, the diary cannot be recovered - by design
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Markdown, always
Entries are written in Markdown and stored in the encrypted vault. No proprietary format: export everything to a folder of
.mdfiles in one click: the app can also verify, export, or rekey a vault. -
Your choice of location
The vault is an ordinary folder: keep it on an internal disk, an external drive, or a mounted encrypted disk image.
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Encrypted full-text search
Search runs inside the encrypted database. Nothing is indexed in plaintext, anywhere.
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Auto-lock
The vault locks when idle, sleep, screen lock - and the keys are wiped from memory.
How it protects your data
The Rust core owns all keys, all file access, and all cryptography; the interface never holds a decryption key or touches vault internals directly. Encryption protects your diary at rest.
Take it home
- macOS .dmg, ad-hoc signed — Gatekeeper blocks it on first open: right-click → Open, or build from source
- Ubuntu .deb package — installs directly
- Windows per-user installer, unsigned — SmartScreen will warn: More info → Run anyway, or build from source
On macOS and Windows, building from source skips the
warnings entirely. Every release ships
SHA256SUMS with a minisign signature, and
the source builds
from a tag — rebuilding is the trust anchor.