We just updated Notebooks for Mac and extended the public beta for another six weeks. For us, NB/Mac does not feel like the final version 1.0 yet, and so we want to spend some more time to add a few things that are obviously missing and to remove a few rough edges.
NB/Mac beta 5 is available for download until mid of August.
[button style=”download” link=”/Download/Notebooks%20for%20Mac%201.0b5.dmg.zip”]Download Public Beta[/button]
We also want take this opportunity to thank you for your valuable feedback.
Notebooks for Mac – Public Beta extended
Alfons – I’m using this for comments as it is the latest news item, but my point is really to do with Notebooks for iPad.
I downloaded v.5.0.3 for iPod/Phone a day or two ago, but v.5.0.2 for iPad has not yet appeared – or at least I haven’t seen it. Have I missed something? I’m using 5.0.1 happily enough, but I like to keep up with upgrades in case there is some problem which I haven’t yet encountered. Are Apple still making trouble with v.5.0.2 for iPad?
Best wishes ——— BK
Oops. V.5.0.3 for iPad has just appeared in my App Store page. Previous comment therefore is worthless. Thanks.
BK
Any news on when the Windows Beta is due out?
Thanks. I was getting notices that the beta I had would be expiring but I figured I’d get a notice that version 1 would be replacing it. I just went to open the beta and got a pop-up that it had expired, so I’m glad there’s a new version! Whew.
I’ve just found out there was a Notebooks for Mac beta a couple days ago, putting it thru its paces. Seems to work wonderfully for notes, but doesn’t seem to work quite right for task lists.
I could be missing something, but if I create a task on the desktop version, it seems to be a little finicky about what gets synced with Notebooks for iPhone running on my iPod Touch. The only way I have found to get it to work is update the status of the task items on the desktop, let DropBox sync and then manually make the Notebooks for iPhone sync.
I do have sync system files setting turned on for Notebooks for iPhone, if that makes a difference.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say it’s not syncing newly created task list items with no status set.
Hi Kenny,
I just made a few tests but was unable to reproduce the effect you describe. Actually, NB handles tasks and documents identical…
Could it be that Dropbox had not finished syncing the new tasks from your Mac to its servers, so it was not yet visible for your “mobile” Notebooks?
This was actually the first app I bought for my iPad way back when. A Mac companion is going to be a huge help in productivity.
Couple of things I’ve noticed that I thought I’d highlight.
1) Drag and drop of files from finder. First I would love to be able to choose copy or move vs just copying. I like the fact that the FS location is behind notebooks and initially had multiple copies of all my files as I organized.
2) Multi file drag and drop. For some reason I can select 2 files in finder but when I drag them over only the first comes into notebook.
3) Customized order. I like how on my iPad I can drag and drop files into the order I want. Would like to see that on the desktop.
4) Like how when you select a folder in the iPad version it auto opens to the folders underneath. Would like that setting in the desktop. In general all you can do to make the two work the same is great.
5) On some apps I am forced to make a duplicate to edit. Numbers works fine but for example preview doesn’t. Say you have a pdf that you want to annotate. Once you open it and say to unlock vs duplicate and make your annotations the app before closing says the doc was passed to it from an application not meant for editing and forces you to make a duplicate.
Thanks for considering these.
Pete
Hi Pete,
thank you for your comments.
1 & 2 are great suggestions, strange that we did not have them on our list yet. Now they are.
3) We are trying to make the complete set of sort options available in 1.0, because I agree, sorting by title or modification date is not sufficient
4) Isn’t that what you can do with a double click on a folder? (We are planning to add a third column, just like Apple Mail, in a version after 1.0; that should make the UI a little more – hmm – modern.)
5) I agree, this is bothersome, but it is due to the Mac OS’ restrictions; when opening a document from the preview in NB, the OS puts it into a protected folder. We have not yet found a way around that yet.
I downloaded the bea and my first impression was it was a Mac app trying to look like an iPad app.
I’m excited about a Mac version! Two comments on b5: (1) It would be good to be able to override iOS font selections. What looks good on the device screen doesn’t on a Mac. (2) I presume you know this already, but if not, files can be sorted only by name; the manual sorting on the iOS side doesn’t come through.
Hello George,
1) I could imaging a setting to ignore a document’s font and instead use a specific default font on the Mac; that would be easy to handle and easy to understand. – Is that what you are suggesting?
2) is on our list, hopefully for 1.0
Best,
Alfons
The iPad version conveniently allows to email a note. Couldn’t the Mac version do the same ? Either autonomously, or by setting up the Mail composition window ?
I love writing short technical notes for some people right in Notebooks and then email them while keeping the short article right in Notebooks which helped me write it up quickly.
Hi Olivier,
Thank you for your suggestion. We have that email option on our todo list already. It is part of a “package” to improve Notebooks’ integration with Mac OS and other apps in general.
What is the easiest way to set up a way to clip web pages and emails to Notebooks for Mac?
Thanks,
Timothy
This was my question as well. There is the bookmarklet, but it does not appear to work on the mac. This would be a great addition, and would be much better replacement then for evernote for me. Thanks
Hi Timothy,
While we are working on a better integration if Notebooks/Mac with other apps on the Mac, pasting web clips into formatted documents is the best option. When you right-click the document you have the choice between “paste and match style” and “paste”; the latter will preserve the format of the original clip as much as possible.
Alternatively, you could save a web page as webarchive and put that into Notebooks’ directory.
As far as email messages are concerned, you could use “save as” in Mail and save the message in its original format into Notebooks’ hierarchy. When viewed on your Mac, the messages will display perfectly, but on an iPad or iPhone thy won’t show at all (we are working on that, too). If you save the message as plain text or HTML, you can view it on your mobile devices, too.
I hope that helps.
Hello. In both the iPad and Mac apps I really appreciate the ability to insert a horizontal line. My question is, why does it insert so much space after the line to the next portion of the document (text, etc.). Is there a way to make it less?
Thank you for your help.
Hi Pat,
The amount of space is defined by the “document style”, which basically is a style sheet (CSS). If you choose then”Minimalist Style”, for example, the amount will be less.
It is possible to define your own styles, if you want, and thus define the overall look of your documents.
Thanks very much.
Hello,
When I copy and paste a piece of text from a PDF-document in Preview it comes with an Apple style and font-family, even when I choose “Paste” instead of “Paste and Match Style”. I also find no way to change the style of the pasted text to Default.
Best regards,
Werner.
Further more, when I paste such a text at the end of the document and then delete everything again, the following remains stuck at the end:
It is not possible to get rid of it.
Werner.
Hello Werner,
thank you for this hint. You are right, the commands to set or reset the document’s formatting are actually meant to take care of this, but when a document was created by Notebooks, they deliberately leave the font settings untouched. – We need to look into this.
Will Notebooks for Mac be supporting native Lion (and Mountain Lion) full screen mode? Hope so. As one of my primary applications (on the iPad, become this on the Mac with file syncing between the two) I want to be able to turn this on and leave it in it’s own “space” which I can swipe into and out of.
Yes, we will try to support the native full screen mode, but you can already assign Notebooks its own space and use it in full screen mode (cmd-0 and cmd-crtl-F)
Best,
Alfons
Hi Alfons,
I am really enjoying Notebooks on my three Apple devices: Mac, iPhone and iPad. The Dropbox integration is working well makes this so useful.
A few requests for the Mac product:
1. Integrate Mac’s spell checking.
2. Integrate / play nice with memory resident auto type replacements (e.g., TextExpander, Typinator, etc.)
3. As others have requested here, allow manual resorting/re-ordering of the Books beyond alpha-numeric order.
4. The selection protocol \ GUI is still confusing to me: I click on a Book several levels removed from the last (now totally unrelated) note or document I was working on. But until I dig into the hierarchy and select a *document* the old document remains as the focal point in the main display panel. Personally I would prefer for this panel to go blank (grey) to indicate the shift in focus away from this topic. Perhaps I am alone in this preference.
Anyway, really enjoying the information organization your apps provide. Thanks!
HinDon,
Thank you for your feedback.
1) & 3) should be done for the final version 1.0, we are working on them right now.
2) is a little more complex, because we are not using the Mac OS’s standard text views; anyway, we will try to find a way integrate with TE
4) No, you are not alone with this 🙂 Like in Notebooks/iPad, we will offer an option to hide the current document when a different book is selected in the treeview.
Best,
Alfons
I’ve been using Notebooks on my iPhone ever since I bought the phone, and I like it. I’m so glad you are making this Mac version because I and in the process of “moving” from my PC to my new Mac and was dreading the thought of trying to figure out (again) how to sync my notes. I’m going to try this beta version and I’ll let you know what I think.
Trying out the Mac beta, and liking it quite a bit. Been looking for a replacement for Journler for way too long… But I need a good iPad app and Mac app that actually sync.
Notebooks is looking it might be it!
One question – do you plan to have full text search on the Mac app? I was surprised it didn’t have that.
Hello Steve,
I agree, the lack of full text search is a bit irritating, but we are currently working on it. Our plans are to have it available for the final version 1.0
Excellent!
Alfons – any thoughts on pricing for 1.0?
Hi Steve,
Yes, we think about pricing a lot, but we have not made a final decision yet…
Most on my list has been already mentioned, although one point I haven’t seen is the request to retain state of the tree view, in other words, if I quit with folders (books) open (disclosure triangles open, showing nested files), I want them open when I relaunch the app, showing the notes within. Thanks!
Notebooks does not retain the full state of the tree view, it just opens the path to the document that was open when you quit the app. But I will put your suggestion on our todo list and we will see what we can make of it.
Wondering if this supports Snow Leopard. Was unable to open it running 10.6.8 on MacBook Pro.
John,
Mac OS 10.6.8 should be fine, but your MacBook Pro needs to have 64 bit architecture. Could that explain why Notebooks refuses to run on your Mac?
I have a core duo, which probably explains why. I get an error message saying something like “application will not work on this device.” Any chance you’ll be developing app for the rest of us? I’m a big fan. I’ve tried other apps but always return to this on iPad and iPhone.
We will see what we can do 😉
Hi Alfons. I am working through the Mac beta. Its looking good and I wish you every success. Just came across a small glitch. I copy an email to my target folder. It appears okay as a notebook, but disappears when I toggle to full screen. If I move to another notebook and then back it reappears. Same happens when I toggle from full screen to normal view. Only happens to my email – not other files!
Useful feature would be ability to action a number of notebooks at once (to delete a group, or move, for example.
Good luck.
Thank you for reporting this glitch, we will look into it!
Processing multiple items at once is on our todo list, this definitely is something we need to add…
Hey guys! Loving the Mac Beta Version of NoteBooks, even though it needs a little work, but that’s live in Beta!
One thing I found: I use Rich txt all the time. Can I make it the default? Also, when I start a note, and go to edit…convert, the option to convert it is dimmed. I have to quit notebooks and restart, and then I can convert.
Thanks!
-Anthony Navarro
The WordPress Dojo
https://thewpdojo.com
Hi Anthony,
you can set the default document type in NB’s settings. This applies to cmd-N only, the “+” button still shows the menu.
I am unable to reproduce that “convert” issue, but we will take a look into it; thank you for reporting!
Best,
Alfons
Greetings, Alfons.
First, thanks so much for this app. I’m using NB/Mac as a task list and it is changing my life. 🙂
I have a few suggestions that I didn’t see in the comments. If they’ve already been addressed, I apologize.
1. I would find it helpful if the NB top level icons for tasks didn’t get a checkmark in the center until all the sub-tasks were complete. I know I can look at the number next to the icon to see how many incomplete tasks remain, but a quick visual cue is helpful.
2. I’d like to be able to set due dates by top level item and cascade down to all sub-tasks. Seeing the due date by the top level item would also be great.
3. Another great visual cue, perhaps as a preference option; once I check off a task as complete, that task has a strikethrough. No strikethroughs on the document, just a strikethrough on the line-item task entry.
Thanks for considering these requests. Keep up the great work!
Hi Loren,
Thanks a lot for your suggestions.
1. Our intentions with that icon was to indicate “this is a task list” rather than indicating its state, which is visible from the badge. But your are right, showing a checkmark for a completed list only would make sense also. – We will think about it.
2. That is a good idea, we’ll put that on our todo list.
3. A good idea also. What we are planning to add (it is already available in the iPhone and iPad versions) is an option not to show done tasks at all or to show done tasks at the end of the list. This way they do not get in your way anymore.
Thanks again and best regards.
Character or text encoding failure with Notebooks for desktop, v. 1.0b5
—
Special characters such as em dashes and ellipsis do not encode properly in an HTML (‘rich text’) document in Notebooks for Desktop.
An em dash ( — ) becomes converted to —Â
An ellipsis ( … ) becomes converted to …
Copying and pasting the text into a different program, then doing search and replace to get rid of those hashes, doesn’t work as an intermediate step, because when I then copy and paste the repaired text back into the ‘rich text’ window, Notebooks insists on forcing those characters beck into their hashed symbols.
When I type — or … directly into the Notebooks document, Notebooks forces it into its hash after a few moments.
It only does this with HTML (‘rich text’ – please stop referring to it as rich text, since that is not what it is); it doesn’t do it with a plain text note.
I don’t know if it’s doing this on iOS or not; I’ve only just noticed it on desktop.
I use em dashes and ellipses all the time, so Notebooks’s behavior in this instance is making my life a hell of a lot harder than it needs to be.
Please advise.
Hello Warren,
The effect you describe is not intended at all; Notebooks uses Unicode text encoding, which is one if the most complete encodings, and special characters should just remain as they are…
Two questions:
– which document style do you use?
– when viewing the html source of one of these documents, which text encoding is defined in its header?
Thank you!
Howdy! I gathered this was unexpected. I’ve been able to replicate it now on both OSX.7 and OSX.8, so it is consistent, if that helps any.
To your questions:
1. I’m just selecting the ‘new rich text’ HTML document option from the + popup menu. I’m not using any custom styles or anything like that.
2. There is no text encoding defined in the HTML header, in the ‘defective’ HTML file.
I’ve just discovered that this comes up only when creating a new document immediately after launching Notebooks, and only when there was a plain text document selected in the list on the left.
When I select an HTML document first, then click + to create a new document, Notebooks behaves as expected and all is well. (The HTML headers then include document encoding types, CSS, and so on.)
Steps to reproduce:
1. Create a new plain text document, and type something into it.
2. Save.
3. Make sure that document is selected, then quit Notebooks.
4. Launch Notebooks again. The plain text document should still be the active one. DO NOT SELECT ANY DOCUMENTS FROM THE LIST AT LEFT.
5. Click + and select ‘Rich Text Document’.
6. Type — and … into the document.
7. Save.
8. Click off the document to any other document.
9. Click the document again. The hash characters appear and the HTML headers are gone.
It’s apparently only the very first HTML document created in Notebooks during any unique launch session that has this problem, provided the last ‘active’ document was plain text, not HTML. Creating a second HTML document seems to cause Notebooks to behave as expected thereafter.
Wow, thanks a lot or this detailed description! With that is should be easy for us to reproduce/fix the issue. – A new beta is due end of this week, and if all goes well, we have it corrected until then.
Thanks again!
My pleasure; glad I could help. Let me know if you have problems reproducing it, though for me it’s consistent…