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QuickText

Part of the 365 Open Source Plan — project #023 · a tray snippet manager & text expander for Windows.

Stop typing the same thing twice. QuickText lives in the Windows tray: store the text you reach for again and again — email, addresses, signatures, templates, canned replies, images — once, then in any input box type a few keystrokes or an abbreviation and it lands right at your cursor. Multi-line, special characters and emoji preserved character-for-character.

Your reusable text, a few keystrokes away — dropped straight at the cursor.

• WPF / .NET 10, single-file portable exe, no account, offline by default — only the optional update check ever contacts GitHub.
• Data is local JSON in your own folder — put it in Dropbox / OneDrive / a NAS to sync.
• Dark theme, 18 UI languages (with right-to-left mirroring for Arabic), settings apply instantly.

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Where you'd use it

Wherever you type the same thing over and over on Windows. It lives in the tray and works in every input box (chat windows, browser forms, editors, mail clients — not tied to one app). It's a snippet manager and text expander in one, plus pinyin search, variable templates, and images.

Who	What they store
Support / e-commerce	Canned replies, standard answers, promo blurbs, QR codes or product shots
Sales / business	Email templates, openers, quotes, sign-offs
Developers / ops	Commands, config, JSON, boilerplate ({...} emitted verbatim, never parsed)
Office / form-filling	Email, address, phone, ID numbers, meeting-note templates (prompt you, remember the last value)
HR / admin / legal	Onboarding notices, standard notifications, disclaimers — local, offline, fit for sensitive content

See it in 30 seconds

In any place you can type — say you need your email in a chat box:

1. Summon — press Ctrl+Shift+8; the panel appears over the active window.
2. Search — type a few letters; matches are highlighted. It matches the name, pinyin (full + initials), abbreviation, and body.
3. Enter — the email is pasted right where your cursor was. Done.

Type nothing to browse by category, with Recent / Favorites pinned on top; the ones you use most float to the top automatically. ↑↓ move · ←→ switch category · Alt+1–9 quick-pick · double-click to send · Esc to close.

Three ways to reach it — pick what fits

Same library, three ways to pull from it; mix them freely:

Way	How to trigger	Best for
🔍 Panel search	Ctrl+Shift+8 → type → Enter	Many snippets, occasional use, browsing to pick
⌨️ Inline abbreviation	Just type ;sig then Space / Tab / Enter	High-frequency fixed phrases, no panel needed
🧩 Variable template	Pull a snippet with {variables} via either of the above	Email / forms: one template, a few words changed

• Images too: add from clipboard or file, pasted as an image on send; images can have abbreviations, so type the abbr and get the picture (QR codes, logo signatures).
• Per-snippet output: chat phrases auto-send after paste, code snippets never do — they don't interfere.

Full detail on abbreviations and variables is in In detail below — the Placeholders and Abbreviations sections.

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In detail

Works out of the box

Double-click QuickText.exe; it lives in the system tray (no taskbar button). On first run it:

• drops in a small starter library (two categories, in your UI language) so you can try it immediately;
• shows a balloon with the summon hotkey — default Ctrl+Shift+8.

The panel's top-right icons: ＋ New · Manager (open the editor) · Settings · 📌 Pin (keep the panel open after a send, to fire several in a row). Jump straight to the Manager / Settings without going back to the tray.

Add / edit your text

• Tray → Open Manager — the full editor: categories on the left, snippets on the right, editor below. Add/rename/delete categories (with a 7-color tag), edit snippets (name, abbreviation, body, image). Drag to reorder or move between categories; Ctrl+Z undoes a delete.
• Tray → New from clipboard — create a new snippet from the current clipboard and open it in the Manager to finish (saved when the Manager is saved/closed).
• Create in the panel — type the text in the search box and press Ctrl+N to save it as a new snippet (that text becomes the body; @category … files it in that category) and jump to the Manager to finish (Ctrl+E edits the selected one).

Placeholders (one template, many situations) · opt-in per snippet

Placeholders are a per-snippet switch: tick "Enable {variable} placeholders" in the Manager editor and the tokens below are resolved on send; left unticked (the default), the body is sent verbatim — code, scripts and JSON full of literal {...} are never misparsed or prompted on.

Upgrading: placeholders used to be always-on. The first launch after upgrading automatically ticks the switch for existing snippets whose body contains {...}, so nothing changes behavior; untick it in the Manager for the ones that are actually code.

When enabled, these placeholders are resolved on send:

Placeholder	What it does
{name} (any label)	Prompts you to fill it in before pasting; remembers your last value so repeats don’t re-ask
{name:John}	Variable with a default, prefilled in the prompt
{env|dev|test|prod}	Variable with options — the prompt shows a dropdown (first option doubles as the default; free typing still allowed)
{clipboard}	Inserts the current clipboard contents
{cursor}	Leaves the caret at this spot after pasting (also suppresses auto-Enter)
{date} {time} {datetime}	Inserts the current date/time; supports offsets like {date+7} (7 days out) and custom formats like {date=MMM d, yyyy} / {time=HH:mm:ss}, combinable with offsets: {date+7=MM-dd}. Formats are WYSIWYG (: / output verbatim, always Gregorian), and {date=dddd} names the weekday in the interface language. Chinese aliases {日期} / {时间} / {日期时间} also work
{uuid} {random}	Random values: a UUID / 6 digits, fresh per occurrence
{snippet:name}	Inlines another snippet's body (3 levels deep, cycle-safe) — keep shared signatures in one place

Example: a signature Best regards,\n{name} (with placeholders enabled) → asks for the name on send → pastes the finished signature.

Abbreviations (expand as you type, no panel) · optional

Give a snippet an abbreviation to expand it directly in any input box. The trigger prefix is set once in Settings (default ;):

1. In the Manager, type just the abbreviation itself — e.g. sig for your signature. The prefix is added automatically (don't retype it); the field shows the current prefix ; in front.
2. In any input box type ;sig (= prefix + abbreviation) then Space / Tab / Enter → it deletes ;sig and expands the body (a {placeholder} prompts first when that snippet has placeholders enabled).
3. Mistyped? Press Backspace right after the expansion to revert it back to ;sig (same window, within 5 s).

Details: matching is case-insensitive (;SIG fires with CapsLock on); a typo corrected with Backspace still expands; two snippets sharing an abbreviation get an inline warning in the Manager; and the tray menu has a one-click “Pause expansion” toggle (for demos/games).

About the prefix: the prefix (default ;) keeps ordinary typing / pinyin from false-triggering a bare abbreviation. Change it under Settings → Abbreviations → Trigger prefix (to ,, :, …) or leave it empty. A prefixed abbreviation is self-delimiting and fires even glued to the preceding text (e.g. thx;sig); with no prefix it only fires as its own word (never as the tail of a longer one like graf). You can also disable abbreviations per app (a blacklist, e.g. cmd.exe; putty.exe) or turn them off entirely.

Output & common settings (Tray → Settings)

• Output — default “paste into the active app”; or “copy to clipboard only” (you paste with Ctrl+V). Optional: press Enter after pasting, single-click to send, restore clipboard. Each snippet can override this (Manager → Output: follow global / paste / paste + Enter / copy only) — chat phrases auto-send, code snippets never do.
• Panel position — follow the active window (default) / follow the text caret / remember last position.
• Summon method (pick one) — ① key combo: click the box and press a new one (ordinary keys need Ctrl/Alt/Shift/Win; function keys F1–F24 work on their own); or ② tap a modifier: single- or double-tap one modifier (e.g. right Ctrl, right Shift) to summon (a lone modifier can't be a normal hotkey, so it's detected by tap). Choosing tap disables the combo — the two are mutually exclusive, so it's always clear which one is live.
• Capture hotkey — optional second combo that silently saves the clipboard as a new snippet (balloon feedback, no window).
• Data folder — point it at a sync drive; export / import backup (zip, validated with an overwrite confirm); daily auto-backup to this machine (newest 10 kept, one-click folder access).
• Language — 18 languages: English · 简体中文 · 繁體中文 · 日本語 · 한국어 · Español · Português · Français · Deutsch · Italiano · Русский · Tiếng Việt · ไทย · Bahasa Indonesia · हिन्दी · বাংলা · العربية (RTL) · Türkçe, switched instantly. Start with Windows optional.
• Check for updates — off by default; when on, the app contacts GitHub once at startup to see if a newer release exists (the only time it goes online). "Check now" runs it on demand.

Keyboard cheat-sheet

Action	Keys
Summon / close panel	Ctrl+Shift+8 (configurable) / Esc
Select / switch category / quick-pick	↑↓ / ←→ / Alt+1–9
Send	Enter or double-click (single-click optional)
Favorite / unfavorite	Ctrl+D
Create / edit in panel	Ctrl+N / Ctrl+E
Undo delete (Manager)	Ctrl+Z
Abbreviation: trigger / undo	type abbr + Space·Tab·Enter / Backspace after expanding

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Features at a glance

• Summon: global hotkey — a key combo (function keys work as a single key) or single/double-tap a modifier (e.g. right Ctrl), pick one; panel follows active window / text caret / remembered position; top-row buttons jump to New / Manager / Settings; pin it to send several in a row; drag & resize with remembered size.
• Search: name / pinyin / initials / abbreviation / body, highlighted; ties broken by usage frequency (frecency); @category keywords scopes the search to one category (bare @category browses it).
• Content: plain text (multi-line, special chars, emoji lossless), placeholders (defaults / option dropdowns / snippet nesting / custom date formats / uuid / random — opt-in per snippet), images (from clipboard or file, pasted as an image on send; images can have abbreviations too — type the abbr, get the image).
• Abbreviations: terminator-triggered, variable prompt, one-press undo, Backspace typo-correction, case-insensitive, click breaks the token, duplicate warning, per-app blacklist, one-click tray pause.
• Output: paste directly / copy only; optional auto-Enter, restore clipboard, single-click send; per-snippet output override; capture hotkey (clipboard → snippet in one press).
• Manager: 7 category colors, drag reorder / move, multi-select batch move / delete (Ctrl / Shift select, then right-click), undo delete, trash (30-day restore, with body preview), duplicate-abbr warning, usage stats, no-wrap mode for code, save feedback.
• Data: local JSON, hot-reload (auto-merges external edits / sync), sync-conflict notice, export / import backup, daily auto-backup (10 kept), start with Windows.
• Localization: 18 UI languages (Simplified / Traditional Chinese, English, 日本語, 한국어, Español, Français, Deutsch, Русский, العربية …) with right-to-left mirroring for Arabic, switched live in Settings.
• Robustness: single instance (a second launch summons the search panel instead of double-installing hooks); CI runs tests plus a window smoke-check on every push and publishes a single-file exe on v* tags.

Data & sync

Data folder (default Documents\QuickText, changeable in Settings, can point at a sync drive):

<data folder>/
  ├─ index.json        # category order + each category's file name and color
  ├─ <category>.json   # the snippets in that category (Snippet[])
  ├─ trash.json        # soft-deleted snippets (auto-purged after 30 days)
  └─ images/           # image files for image snippets

• Snippet: { id, name, abbr, body, useVariables, outputMode, imagePath?, updatedAt }.
• Atomic writes (*.tmp → File.Replace) so a sync never reads a half-written file; FileSystemWatcher hot-reload (coalesced), with a self-write guard.
• Machine-local state stays out of the sync folder: settings in %APPDATA%\QuickText\settings.json, usage counts / favorites in %APPDATA%\QuickText\usage.stats (they change on every send and would conflict across machines), daily auto-backups in %APPDATA%\QuickText\backups\.
• Portable mode (trace-free / USB): turn it on under Settings → Data → Portable mode — it drops a QuickText.portable marker next to QuickText.exe and applies on the next restart (the first portable start carries your settings and usage across, so you don't reconfigure). Settings, usage, backups and the default library then live under <exe folder>\Data\ instead of %APPDATA% / Documents, and "start with Windows" uses a Startup-folder shortcut rather than the registry — so the whole tool travels on a stick and leaves nothing on the host. The app must sit in a writable location (a USB stick, not Program Files); the text library moves via Export / Import backup. Start-with-Windows is tracked per mode, so re-tick it in the new mode after switching if you want it. Leave it off for the installed layout above (the right choice when the data folder is a sync drive).
  (It has to be a marker file, not a plain setting — it decides where settings.json itself lives; the switch only takes effect next start, never disturbing the current session.)

Brand

Assets live in assets/branding/: quicktext-mark.svg (primary), quicktext-mark-mono.svg (monochrome), quicktext.ico (16–256, app / tray icon), quicktext-256.png, quicktext-social.png (1200×630 og:image), quicktext-social-2x.png (2400×1260 @2x), brand.html (brand sheet). The mark is a text I-beam caret on a mint tile beside an amber block of just-landed text — “text▮”, i.e. putting your text at the cursor. Palette “terminal dusk”: mint (the app accent #3DC2A0) + amber #F2B457 on teal-biased ink; a sans wordmark paired with Cascadia Code mono.

Architecture

Pure Core (no Win32, unit-testable) kept separate from Win32/UI.

Project	Contents
src/QuickText.Core	Models, Persistence (Store, UsageStore, JsonConfig), Search (SearchIndex), Abbr (AbbrMatcher), Snippets (Placeholders), Pinyin, Settings, Localization (.resx, 18 languages)
src/QuickText.App	WPF UI (SearchPanel / ManagerWindow / SettingsWindow / AppDialog / VariablesDialog), Ui/Theme.xaml (dark theme), Interop (GlobalHotkey, KeyboardHook, PasteEngine, Autostart, NativeMethods)
tests/QuickText.Core.Tests	Core unit tests (xUnit)

Build & run

dotnet build QuickText.sln -c Debug
dotnet test  tests/QuickText.Core.Tests/QuickText.Core.Tests.csproj
dotnet run  --project src/QuickText.App        # or run QuickText.exe under bin

Publish a single-file portable build (win-x64):

dotnet publish src/QuickText.App -c Release -p:PublishProfile=win-x64

Requires the .NET 10 SDK. Windows only (Win32 global hotkey / keyboard hook / clipboard).

About the 365 Open Source Plan

This is project #023 of the 365 Open Source Plan.

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License

MIT License · Copyright © 2026 rockbenben. Free to use, modify, and distribute.