You can, if you wish, mimic the traditional green on black WriteRoom appearance. You can also change text colour and text background. Nebulous Notes is the only one allow you to hide all toolbars and simply see the text you are working on.Įlements has customisable fonts from a wide range of Apple styles. PlainText retains a top menu bar which contains the file name and a navigation key to take you back to folder level. Elements doesn’t allow a completely blank screen, insisting on always showing the top and bottom toolbar. Lightly tapping the bottom right of the screen brings up three opaque buttons for fullscreen, settings and sharing.Īll three applications have a very clean interface and allow you to concentrate on writing. 3) Nebulous Notes has the cleanest interface with no visible toolbars and no iPhone carrier details. Settings are available only from the folder list and not from within a file. 2) PlainText always shows the top titlebar. This can be a big problem if you forget and I definitely prefer auto syncing.Ībove (left to right): 1) Elements shows two toolbars and all functions are easy to find as a result. Unlike the other two apps which have automatic syncing, Nebulous Notes requires you to press the UPLOAD button to sync the file to Dropbox. Obviously you can store your files in the Elements folder if you also intend to use Elements. You can view the contents of any folder in Dropbox and open/save files into any folder. Here you have complete freedom – some might say too much because you could in theory try to open Dropbox files you really shouldn’t.
I chose the existing Elements folder where I was forced to keep all my Elements files. You can, however, choose any folder in Dropbox. Like Elements, PlainText can address only one folder and suggests you call it PlainText. You cannot navigate to other folders in Dropbox. It creates a folder called Elements where all files are stored. This app is the most restrictive in where it expects to save and find text files in Dropbox.
Simplenote tags notational velocity mac#
While none of them has a direct OS X sister application, the crucial fact is that the text file is sitting right there in Dropbox and can be attacked by any Mac editor such as Text Edit or Write Room. I don’t need to emphasise that Dropbox only works if you have an internet connection but any changes you make to files will be synced as soon as a connection is re-established.Īll three apps present a clean, quick and easy means of entering text. All this works surprisingly well and Dropbox works quickly. After a paragraph or two in Elements I moved to PlainText and continued writing then a visit to Nebulous Notes. Because of such easy and reliable syncing I was able to write this post partly on different apps.
Simplenote tags notational velocity how to#
A must for me is Dropbox synchronisation all three apps support this although all have a slightly different take on how to do it (see more on this later). Three of of the best text editors for iOS, in my opinion, are Elements, PlainText and Nebulous Notes. You should definitely have Simplenote and NV installed, but they are not a substitute for the apps we’re discussing here. On the Mac there are several applications that mimic Simplenote, including the excellent Notational Velocity. Simplenote doesn’t sync with Dropbox but has it’s own server. It’s ideal for bits of information that you need to access easily or frequently. In Simplenote you shovel in random thoughts and bits and bobs into one file and, thanks to the superb search facilities, you can usually find anything you want when you need it. It is not quite the same as the file-based apps reviewed here. I suspect, though, that the features are similar on both small and large screen.īefore I get complaints that I have ignored perhaps the most popular text app of all, Simplenote, let me say that I use it constantly. Since I don’t currently have access to an iPad I cannot draw any conclusions there. I have chosen three applications that I have used and that have a good following in technical blogs and in reviews. In this review I am concentrating on iPhone and iPod touch applications for quick text entry while on the go. Problem is, there are dozens of note apps for the iPhone and iPad so a little focus is needed. In this love of simple, plain text I am aligned with some leading lights in the tech blogging world – people like David Sparks of MacSparky who was the inspiration for this post.
These days I seldom need to prepare fancy documents for printing and I am only an infrequent user of traditional word processing applications such as Word or Pages. In common with most writers I’m addicted to note taking apps and I prefer working in plain text with a minimum of distractions.
0 kommentar(er)
