My first Mac App - a distraction-free note taking app | Hacker News Reader

My first Mac App - a distraction-free note taking app

lesen.co

30 pointsnocomp52 comments

Congrats on your first mac app!

Rather than spelling out features (or the lack of features), it is much better to show them the features through screenshots on the page.

A link to a page dedicated to screenshots creates friction and the lack of description can be confusing.

Good point. Do you know any good screenshots tool on Mac? I used the built-in Grab on Mac.

SnapNDrag. Looks like they've got an app in the mac app store now, but they also still have a free downloadable dmg, and it's totally worth taking a look.

BTW, did you mean "Rediscover the joy..." It says "Rediscovery the joy..."

Will give it a try. Is rediscovery a noun?

Yes.

command + shift + 4 (+ spacebar to capture only the window)

This looks good (I can't download at work due to the proxy, but will later), thanks

The built in screenshot shortcuts work just fine. If you're looking for something a little more robust with annotation tools, checkout Little Snapper: http://www.realmacsoftware.com/littlesnapper/

"...it is much better to show them the features through screenshots on the page."

I actually appreciated that he gave a concise description of the product and its features up front, before I invested time in looking at screenshots.

It might be the design imperative du jour, but too many of the cookie-cutter Bootstrap pages we're seeing are horribly conceived in terms of UX. If the page requires that I scroll endlessly through pages and pages of screenshots and text just to get a basic understanding of the product and get introduced to its feature set, that's too much friction.

This looks very similar to iA Writer: http://www.iawriter.com/mac/

Probably because of the light interface and the blue cursor. I still use iA writer, but just for different purpose.

Looks like a nice app, congrats. Q: What are your thoughts about how similar it looks to iaWriter? (http://www.iawriter.com/mac/) e.g. right down to the blue color of the cursor bar ... and not to mention the website itself (load the two side by side and have a look)

I use and like iA writer too. The blue cursor idea is indeed from iA writer, though different blue. Probably I should mention it somewhere. Thanks for pointing this:)

The only major difference I see is the search and note sidebar. Which, IMO, is an iOSified improvement over iA's file picker.

So, out of interest. What bit of this is original design or conception? It all looks like a blatant plagiarism of iA Writer to me. "Different shade of blue", FFS!

Congratulations! I love the idea and your execution is pretty great too, some feedback below...

Bug reports:

- If you create a new notebook, and then rename it using Right-click "Rename", the drop down still shows the old name.

- The app is called "Lenote" in the App Store, but "lenote" when you download it (lowercase), these should be the same.

- When you have no note selected, the "three bar" icon in the upper right can still be activated but does nothing. Either don't show it, or don't make it bold when you mouse over it.

Feature requests:

- Can you make it work with a directory of text files? That way I don't have to change my workflow, it becomes a better way to view and edit notes that I've accumulated over time. Alternatively, could provide import/export functionality.

- Full-screen support.

- When you have no note selected, it shows "No Selection" as the title, it would be nice to allow a user to make a new note by changing the title, or typing into the text area. Having to click "Notes" then "New Note" or Right-Click "New Note" is awkward. Alternatively, a simple "New Note" button would be nice.

Other comments:

- Notes can have the same name as other notes, which is both nice and confusing.

Thanks for the bug reports, will be solved in the next release.

Feature requests: 1. it's on the feature list 2. the main window support full-screen, the note window doesn't 3. Or you can simple press Command+N :)

Love it. I don't know if its any better than Byword, iA Writer, Mou or Notational Velocity (Still my absolute favorite). But I do like the interface and reminders feature. When I write, I like to keep my fingers on the keyboard so it would be nice to have a keyboard shortcut for displaying the note's details instead of clicking on the top right of the app. Also, how about an alternative dark interface for those of us that prefer writing during the night?

No one compare it with Evernote on Mac or the built-in notes? I made a few dark themes actually, but dark color doesn't match the default popoever color.

My problem with both of those apps is the slow startup time. Notes.app startup is annoyingly slow when iCloud is enabled and there's a large number of notes. Evernote doesn't truly feel minimalist either. There's certainly a lot more chrome.

I like your app. You're going to get some criticism for it looking a lot like iawriter, but I think that's ok. A lot of people want a minimal note taking app that has some modicum of sophistication (e.g searching notes).

Idea: Can we hide, or collapse the left side bar? That way we'll be able to have a narrow window off to the right/left edges of the screen, much like the notification pane in Mountain Lion.

Thanks, very encouraging :)

I was trying to implement that way, but instead I decided to let people open a note in a separate window (Double click a note on the side bar) so there won't be another button in the typing area.

Great app! I use everything from textmate to vim for taking notes on mac.

Looking forward to the sync feature. It will be helpful if the app allows for creation of protected notes (I currently use encrypted text files `vim -x` to create/store things like card info etc)

Thanks:) I used to use textmate for taking notes. A question, why do you want a encrypted note? Is it because you also work on public computer?

No, i work on my own laptop. I encrypt these notes because: - I dont want to store them in plain text. It feels unsafe :) - I want to copy paste my card/account info easily so I still need them around on my laptop

Congratulations! The app is great and I have been using it for the last couple of days.

One thing I would love to see is an option for strikethrough in addition to bold, italic and underline. I'm using the app as my todo list and it would be a great addition.

I stared at the landing page for a few seconds, waiting for it to do something. Then, I clicked around furiously trying to figure out what I was supposed to do. Then I accidentally scrolled down and found the content.

The landing page is a little confusing...

Probably because of bad network connection, try reload it.

It's because I can't see any content. My viewport is arguably smaller than most since I don't auto-hide my dock...

Here is what I see: http://i.imgur.com/HeProLG.png

Very good app, you should get inspired by nvALT, for instance:

- real-time filter as you search - sync with Simplenote - ability to show / hide the sidebar - show notes as a list above the note rather than on the side - show markdown as HTML - bookmarks

Seems many people use simplenote, what's the differences between simplenote and evernote? I haven't used simplenote.

It is text only, and there is a synchronization API

Nice app, I look forward to seeing it grow. Like some others have mentioned here, I was left to hunt for screenshots. With something like note taking, which has been reinvented hundreds of times, showing off your take on the UI is very important.

I've been using your app for last few days, pretty awesome! Like the simplicity. Good Job!

I like it - is there a way to find the notes as (if possible text-) files or maybe even set the directory where they are served? Would be awesome if I could set it to the same Dropbox directory as NValt.

Notes are automatically stored in a database at /Users/{Your-username}/Library/Application Support/Lesen.lenote/lenote.sqlite. I am working on the cloud feature:)

Very nice, minimalist, design. Just throwing this out there, but having you considered adding syntax highlight modes, like emacs? This could be a great, non-threatening text editor for new programmers.

Thanks. I did consider syntax highlight so we can put some code there. But with this feature I don't know what Lenote is.

Very nice app here. Always have been interested in distraction-free writing apps. And this compares well to the other senior ones.

Does it save documents automatically?

It does.

First thought: The screenshots could easily be mistaken for FoldingText (http://www.foldingtext.com).

That was my first thought too. Almost went looking too see if it was the same creators, a "rebrand" or something like that.

This looks great! Is it possible to backup or export notes? That's the only thing stopping me from using it right now.

Will be available in the next release:)

Wow, I really like this. I'd pay $15 if it had the ability to write in / import / export markdown.

I actually removed the feature, I wasn't sure people would want it.

This looks awesome but I'm too broke to run it. I only have a 32 bit mac.

Cool! I'd pay for markdown and simplenote sync support ;)

Yeah, many people asking for Cloud feature. I am working on that:)

iCloud is a must for any note app. I definitely like putting something on my iPhone then checking my iPad/iMac later in the day to read/edit it later on a bigger screen. Congratulations on your app!

How does it compare to something like iA Writer?

why don't compare it to the built-in Notes or Evernote :)

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