May 31, 2016

Sublime Tutor: Sensei for Aspiring Sublime Text Ninjas

Product: Sublime Tutor
Price: Free

Keyboard commands. That is what separates the text editor ninja from the novice. On the path to text editing ninja status, you are better off picking one text editor and learning it. Learn it deeply. That means you have to learn the keyboard commands that allow you to do stuff in the text editor. Every command has one, the more you know, the more efficient you are in it.

The less you have to go to the menus, or click on buttons, or use the mouse at all, the more efficient you will be.

How Do You Reach Ninja State?

  1. Pick a text editor. Any one. On the Mac, Sublime Text 3, BBEdit, Atom, TextMate, vim, emacs, or, Chocolat, are all good choices. I use Sublime Text 3.
  2. Stay in that text editor for all your text editing needs. Keep it open all the time. Work in it whenever you are writing something.
  3. Infuse the keyboard commands into your muscle memory. How does one do this?

Keyboard Commands Into Muscle Memory

How do you fuse the knowledge of keyboard commands into your muscles?

  1. Learn them. In Sublime Text 3 and Atom, you can reach every command by evoking the command palette (⌘+⇧+P). Then you start typing words from the command you need and the fuzzy search gives you the command you are looking for. Next to it, is the keyboard command. Make a note of it, use it. Next time, avoid the command palette, type the keyboard command. In BBEdit, check out the Menus and Shortcuts preferences. In most other text editors read the manual or the help files. Search the Internet for cheatsheets.
  2. Learn them in bunches. Few of them at a time. Use them. Don't try to learn all of them at one time. You are not going to get there. Learn them in small batches. Let your muscles, both your fingers and your brain learn them, get used to them, welcome them into your life. Do this again and again.
  3. Give yourself time. You are not going to become a text editing ninja in a week or a month. It is going to take time. Give yourself that time.
  4. If you keep at it, you are going to get there. You are going to achieve ninja status.

Being a Sublime Text user, I am interested in learning how to use the text editor better and there is a new plugin which aids this effort.

Sublime Tutor is an attempt to teach you keyboard commands in Sublime Text 3 through a tutorial which is built into the program. It derives inspiration from vimtutor, and delivers small chunks of information to you, to aid you in the process of achieving true Sublime Text 3 mastery.

You can use package control to install the plugin. You can read about it here. Check out the package control page here.

It comes with 6 modules, 39 chapters and 70 features and shortcuts. It is intensive, it is complete and it is well organized. It will take time to get through it all. Don't hurry that process. It is not sensible to expect to incorporate all of that information into your workflow at once. Let it seep into your muscle memory. Do a few chapters at a time. Use what you have learned. When you get comfortable with it, ingest a few more chapters. Repeat the process again and again.

I am grateful to Jai Pandya for making this available. It is a fantastic resource and a worthwhile addition to the Sublime Text 3 arsenal. Thank you Jai.

macosxguru at the gmail thingie

Keyboard commands SublimeText
May 26, 2016

Segue Down the Analog Road: The rOtring Rapid Pro 2.0 Mechanical Pencil

Product: rOtring Rapid PRO Mechanical Pencil, 2 mm, Matte Black

I don't know much about Bauhaus School of Art and Design. I do know that they inspired the design of the best mechanical pencil that I have ever used.

rOtring has been making the Rapid Pro line of mechanical pencils since 2010. rOtring describes them as "an innovative 2mm pencil with push mechanism and fine-lead pencils with cushion point mechanism & tubular sliding point. A perfect professional tool!"

This is how it comes packaged.

Rapid Pro PackageRapid Pro Package

This is the pencil.

The PencilThe Pencil

Why is this special?

The feel. The weight. The quality of the engineering. It is beautiful. It is heavy. Seems to be the perfect weight for writing. All of that translates into the following: I want to use this pencil. I want to write, even when I have nothing to write about.

As you can probably tell, I love this pencil.

Recommended heartily.

While I am talking about the pencil, you can get lead for the pencil here.

You also need a pencil sharpener, and this is the best one I have seen.

macosxguru at the gmail thingie

Pencil
May 24, 2016

How Well Is the Mac App Store Curating?

Apps for WritersApps for Writers

The Mac App Store has a ton of applications. Unless you know about an application, it is very difficult to wade through all of the choices and make an informed, intelligent choice. This process is helped by the special sections Apple curates to help the customer along the process of decision making. This is a responsibility Apple should take seriously, they are the authority providing the direction. Their credibility and trust are on the line. I wanted to see how well Apple is doing.

I decided to look at the special section called Apps for Writers. Primarily because this is the category I know best in the store. The section is broken up into four categories:

  1. Manuscript Makers
  2. Distraction-Free Writing
  3. Journaling & Blogging
  4. Notes & Clippings

I would have liked another section. Aid to Writers. This would include tools which make the process of writing easier and better. This would include Pomodoro timers, grammar checkers, Markdown previewers and the like.

Manuscript Makers

Product Last Updated Comments
Pages May 10, 2016 Great
iBooks Author Mar 29, 2016 Great
Ulysses Apr 20, 2016 Great
Scrivener Sept 30, 2015 Great
iA Writer Apr 22, 2016 Fits better in Distraction-Free Writing, Great
Final Draft 9 Sept 18, 2015 Industry Standard
Storyist Dec 10, 2015 Meh
Mellel Apr 13, 2016 Great
MovieDraft Feb 07, 2012 Old
Slugline Feb 17, 2016 Great

I am not certain iA Writer fits in this category. Distraction-Free Writing is the better category for it. iA Writer has broadened its scope through support of file directories but it is still a single document centric application. You can read a review here.

MovieDraft hasn't had an update for more than four years now. Is this still a viable product?

This list doesn't seem to be an attempt to pick the best of breed. Ulysses, Scrivener and Storyist, are all playing in the same space. Final Draft 9 and Slugline though fundamentally different products are catering to the same audience, the screenwriter. So, it is not a best of breed exercise. It is a list of the notables. In that case, it makes sense to visit the word-processor category.

Besides Pages, Mellel is the only word-processor in the list. Wouldn't it make sense to include Nisus Writer Pro also in this list? It is being continuously developed, has an absolutely fanatic bunch of users, and is very competent at what it does, process words.

Distraction-Free Writing

Product Last Updated Comments
Byword Mar 24, 2016 Good
Rough Draft Mar 24, 2016 Gimmicky
Flowstate Feb 08, 2016 Gimmicky
Paragraphs Feb 18, 2016 Meh
Write Dec 14, 2014 Developer classifies as abandonware.
Ommwriter Dana II Dec 31, 2012 Old and Gimmicky
WriteRoom Aug 08, 2012 Old
Macchiato Aug 24, 2011 Old
MachWrite Mar 24, 2015 Good

iA Writer should be in this section.

I think Rough Draft, Flowstate, and Ommwriter Dana II are just too gimmicky. I would never use them. But I understand that gimmicks sell. So, I am not going to bitch too much about the choice of these products.

Write is classified as abandonware by the developer. Why is it on this list? WriteRoom? Almost four years without an update? The last update was to make it compatible with Lion! Macchiato? That is a product which last got updated five years ago? Really? That is the best available in the App Store?

What about Focused? What about Writed Pro. There are alternatives which are more current than the ones listed. You cannot tell me that there is no better product in the App Store than the one last updated in 2011.

Journaling & Blogging

Product Last Updated Comments
Day One Apr 25, 2016 Good
Desk PM Apr 07, 2016 Good
MarsEdit Apr 14, 2016 Great
Blogo May 21, 2016 Good
My Wonderful Days Apr 07, 2015 I don't know this one
Memories Mar 11, 2016 I don't know this one
Memoires Apr 01, 2011 Old

This is a shorter category. I don't have any gripe about the choices, except for Memoires which is 5 years old. I also don't know anything about two of the choices.

Notes & Clippings

Product Last Updated Comment
Evernote Apr 22, 2016 Good
Notability Mar 17, 2016 Meh
Notefile Sep 01, 2015 Meh
Ember Oct 23, 2015 Aid
Simplenote Jan 26, 2016 Great
1Checker Apr 28, 2015 Aid
MindNode May 17, 2016 Great
OmniOutliner Pro May 17, 2016 Great
Together 3 May 19, 2016 Good
Scapple Oct 21, 2014 Good
Scribe - Intuitive Outliner Dec 02, 2014 Meh

Ember and 1Checker shouldn't be in this section. They are aids to writing/thinking. They are not involved in notes or clippings. They belong to the Writing Aids section Apple should add to this list. There are however, some glaring omisions in this list. I think Quiver should be in this list, so should TextNut. I think OmniOutliner Pro is a great choice, but Scribe has a lot more competitors in its price range, and OutlineEdit, Tree 2 and Outlinely all deserve consideration. Likewise Together 3 is a great product but Growly Notes deserves some attention too. Notability and Notefile have iOS counterparts, and if that is a consideration Notebooks should be on this list.

Aids to Writing

This is the section that is not present.

This can include the following products:

Product What it does
Noizio Provides background noise
WordService Provides commands for working with selected text
Marked 2 Previewer for text markup languages.
Focus - Productivity Timer A pomodoro timer
Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary A good dictionary.

Conclusion

So how did Apple do?

A mixed bag really. Some sensible suggestions, but some howlers too. There should be a cut-off date for old products. For instance, if a product has not been updated for the last two OS revisions, it doesn't deserve inclusion in any curated list. I think the Aids to Writing would improve this list.

I am going to keep a lookout on updates to this and other curated lists for future coverage.

macosxguru at the gmail thingie

Curating Mac App Store Writing
May 21, 2016

Links of Note 2016-05-21

This is beautiful.
A Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) City Guide - Life & Thyme

A write-up on the advantages of Markdown.
You Should Probably Blog in Markdown - Media Temple Blog

We are getting to the point where we need tools to protect the Mac OS from evil. This is a good start.
KnockKnock
RansomWhere?

I bow to you Mr. Stephen Radford.
Restoring an Apple Extended Keyboard II

A lovely free monospace font for coding and writing.
mononoki

macosxguru at the gmail thingie.

Photography Markdown Malware Keyboards Font
May 12, 2016

Tip - Three Fingers to Drag Items on the Mac

I don't know why Apple hides this feature.

Go to the Accessibility preference pane and choose Mouse & Trackpad from the left pane. Click on Trackpad Options

Trackpad OptionsTrackpad Options

From the drop-down menu select Enable dragging and choose three finger drag from the drop-down selector next to it.

Three finger draggingThree finger dragging

Now in the Finder, you can select a file and use three fingers on the keyboard to drag it to a new location. In your text editor, you can select a section with three fingers and drag it to another location in your file. The three finger drag will work in moving objects around in a whole slew of applications.

I still don't know why Apple hides this feature. Shouldn't it be in the Trackpad preference pane?

macosxguru at the gmail thingie

Tip MacOS Trackpad