Tired of talking to AIs via a single line input space ?

Context Pad

Draft and read long-form text locally, then paste it into any AI chat. No server, no install, no dependencies. Open index.html directly in any browser.

The workflow

Chat inputs are built for short messages, not for drafting a system prompt, writing up a bug report, or assembling a wall of context before you paste it in. Context Pad is the scratchpad in between:

1. Write in the Notes tab — a real textarea, not a one-line box.
2. Check the size — live token/word count tells you if it'll fit before you paste.
3. Copy all and hand it to whichever AI you're talking to.

The MD Reader tab is the other half of the loop: open a .md file — a spec, an exported chat, a README — read it formatted, mark it up, edit it in place, and save it back to disk, all without leaving the browser.

Try it

Context Pad

To run it locally, open index.html directly, or serve the folder so the "view the README" sample link works too:

python3 -m http.server 8000

Screenshots

Features

Both tabs keep their actions in a row under the tabs, so they stay visible while you scroll. Actions that can't be used yet stay visible too — clicking one tells you why (for example "Open a file first").

Notes pad

Where you draft. Auto-saves to browser storage as you type, so notes survive between sessions — but the point is getting text out, not storing it.

• Copy all to clipboard
• Save — save notes as a .md file (File System Access API in Chrome/Edge, download fallback in Safari/Firefox)
• Live token and word count so you know it'll fit before you paste
• Rendered / Source toggle — read your notes formatted (headings, tables, annotation tags) without leaving the tab; double-click the rendered view to go back to editing
• Annotate Ctrl+Shift+A — picker that inserts an annotation tag ([EDIT: ], [WRONG: ], …) at the cursor
• Markdown Ctrl+Shift+D — picker with 14 CommonMark snippets (bold, italic, code, strikethrough, link, image, H1–H3, lists, blockquote, code block, divider); wraps selected text or inserts a placeholder
• Clear — can be undone with Ctrl/⌘+Z
• Spell check via browser (toggle in Settings)

MD Reader

Open any local .md file and render it as formatted text — then mark it up and edit it without leaving the tab.

• Headings, lists, bold, italic, inline code, links, images, blockquotes, fenced code blocks and tables (GitHub style, with column alignment; blank lines between rows are tolerated, as in tables pasted from AI chats)
• Two modes:
  • Rendered — double-click any block (paragraph, heading, list, table, quote, code block) to edit its Markdown right where it sits. Esc, Ctrl/⌘+Enter or clicking away finishes the edit. Only the block you edit changes; the rest of the file is kept exactly as it was. + New block (or double-clicking empty space) adds one at the end.
  • Source — the whole file as plain Markdown.
• Annotate and Markdown pickers work in both modes
• Undo / redo — Ctrl/⌘+Z and Ctrl/⌘+Shift+Z step through block edits; a whole Source-mode session counts as one step
• Save (Ctrl/⌘+S) writes back to disk; • modified shows unsaved changes, and the browser warns before closing with any
• To Notes — copies the document into the Notes tab (added below anything already there, never overwriting it)
• Outline sidebar (toggle in the action row) with collapsible sections:
  • Jump to section — highlights the section you're reading
  • Annotations — every tag in the document, grouped by type with a count; expand a type to see its notes and click one to jump to it
• Token and word count
• Nothing is uploaded — files are read locally via the FileReader API

Annotation tags

Inline markers you insert into text to flag issues or changes needed. Syntax: [TYPE: your note here] — e.g. [WRONG: timeline is off].

Default tag types: EDIT, WRONG, INCOMPLETE, SUPERFICIAL, OVERSTATED, STALE, MOVE, CUT.

Tags are colour-coded in the MD Reader and listed in the Annotations sidebar. They are plain text, so they survive copy-paste into any AI chat or text editor.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl+Shift+A	Annotate picker (in Notes, Source mode, or a block being edited)
Ctrl+Shift+D	Markdown picker (same places)
↑ / ↓, Enter	Move through and pick from either picker
Ctrl/⌘+S	Save the current tab
Ctrl/⌘+Z, Ctrl/⌘+Shift+Z	Undo / redo
Esc or Ctrl/⌘+Enter	Finish editing a block

On a Mac, the picker shortcuts use Ctrl, not ⌘.

Theme picker

Four colour themes: Light, Paper, Semi-dark (default), Dark. Each dot shows its theme's colour; the choice persists across sessions.

Settings (⚙)

• Content width — slider from 400 to 1400 px controls whitespace on the sides
• Font — choose from Fira Sans (default), Source Serif 4, Alegreya, Newsreader, Montserrat, or IBM Plex Mono
• Spell check — toggle browser spell-check on the notes textarea
• Table of Contents — show/hide the outline sidebar in the MD reader
• Annotations — add or remove annotation tag types; changes take effect immediately in the picker and in the next MD Reader render

MCP (optional)

Want an AI agent to read your notes and push formatted docs into the Reader tab directly — no copy-paste, no save-then-open? See mcp-server/ for a small local companion server (read_note, show_doc) you can register with Claude Code. Opt-in only — the plain static app above works exactly the same with or without it.

Spell check notes

Spell check in the notes pad relies on the browser and OS:

• Works well in Chrome and Edge on Windows with language set to English
• Toggling the setting in ⚙ re-applies the spellcheck attribute, which can wake up a sluggish browser checker
• If underlines are not appearing, right-click the textarea → Check Spelling (Chrome) or enable spell check in browser settings
• Grammar checking is not available without a third-party API — the browser only flags spelling

Files

File	Purpose
index.html	App shell, tab panels, settings dialog
theme.css	Colour themes and all layout styles
app.js	All behaviour: topbar, tabs, theme, width, notes, MD reader, settings
README.md	This file
mcp-server/	Optional local MCP server — see mcp-server/README.md

Storage keys (localStorage)

Key	What it stores
contextPadTheme	Active theme name
contextPadTab	Last active tab
contextPadNotes	Notes textarea content
contextPadWidth	Content width preset
contextPadSpellcheck	Spell check on/off
contextPadFont	Selected font
contextPadFontSize	Selected font size
contextPadTocVisible	TOC sidebar shown/hidden in MD reader
contextPadAnnotations	User-configured annotation tag types
contextPadNotesView	Notes tab view: Source or Rendered