From Minimal to Mighty: Reimagining ideaDrop.nvim for Serious Idea Management in Neovim

You know that feeling when a tool grows beyond its original purpose?

That's exactly what happened with ideaDrop.nvim—my little side project that began as a floating Markdown sidebar for quick brain dumps and now... well, it's a full-blown idea management system for Neovim.

Let me walk you through the transformation—from a humble plugin to a power user's dream.

The Seed: What ideaDrop Used to Be

The first version of ideaDrop.nvim was minimal by design. Think quick access, minimal interface, and just enough file handling to stay out of your way.

What it did well:

• Let you drop thoughts into a floating Markdown file
• Saved files automatically
• Let you name and nest them in folders
• Gave you a fuzzy picker to open existing notes

Simple. Effective. And very much just enough.

But... something kept nagging me.

The Realization: Notes Deserve Power, Not Just Simplicity

As I started using ideaDrop more regularly—jotting down project specs, startup ideas, random midnight epiphanies—I realized I needed more:

• A persistent view that doesn't vanish when I switch buffers
• A way to browse ideas by tags, not just filenames
• A file tree to see everything at a glance
• Real search, not just a fuzzy filename picker

And most importantly: it needed to scale. Ideas are chaotic. Your tools shouldn’t be.

Multiple View Modes

Forget being stuck with just a floating window. Now you can:

• Pop ideas into a persistent right-side buffer (perfect for long work sessions)
• Replace your current buffer
• Still enjoy the original floating modal
• Or use the new Tree View powered by nvim-tree

It’s your workspace—view it how you want.

Tagging, Supercharged

Idea tagging is now first-class:

• Add or remove tags with commands (:IdeaAddTag, :IdeaRemoveTag)
• Browse by tags (:IdeaTags)
• Search ideas with a specific tag (:IdeaSearchTag)
• Auto-indexes tags from your #hashtags in Markdown

It’s like Obsidian meets Neovim. And it just works.

Fuzzy Search on Steroids

The old fuzzy picker? That was cute.

Now you can:

• :IdeaSearch across titles and content
• Narrow it down with :IdeaSearchTitle or :IdeaSearchContent
• Get instant results as you type
• Jump to exact matches

Seriously, it’s creepily fast.

Built-in File Tree Navigation

If you’re a visual thinker (or just messy like me), the new Tree View is 🔥.

Use :IdeaTree to pop open nvim-tree, and you can:

• Navigate through all your idea folders
• Click to open files
• Create, rename, or delete ideas
• See your whole mental world at a glance

Cleaner, Safer, Smarter

Under the hood, I’ve:

• Added auto-save (no more accidental loss)
• Implemented date-based file naming
• Kept everything in clean, human-readable Markdown
• Improved configuration defaults, but left full control to you

New Keymaps = Instant Productivity

You now get opinionated, intuitive defaults:

Customize them or stick with mine—your call.

Final Thoughts

I didn’t set out to build a full-featured PKM tool inside Neovim.

But here we are.

If you're a developer who lives in Neovim and needs a fast, private, keyboard-first way to manage your brain—ideaDrop.nvim might just be your new second brain.

I use it every day now.

And I built it for people like me. Maybe people like you, too.

👉 Check it out on GitHub
⭐ Star it.
🐛 Break it.
🔧 Hack it.
❤️ Use it.

— Carlos