This looks like iA Writer meets org-mode. It looks nice but the platform limitation is a bit discouraging for those of us that work across multiple platforms on a daily basis.
This is something we're trying to address with the upcoming beta. You can follow us on twitter: @foldingtext, to get news about the beta when we start rolling it out.
As someone who uses Windows at home, iOS to "run my life", and Linux at work, I'm very interested in things that can run across multiple platforms. And as someone who regularly uses Workflowy, what are some things that FoldingText brings to the table that WF doesn't? (aka: why might I want to switch if I were able to use it across the platforms I need to have available?)
I'd be interested to know where folding editors first originated?
We have org-mode now of course.
My first encounter was 28 years ago now - December 1989 - an in-house editor called Teddy written by "Burkhard" that we had running on Vax - for Parasolid development in Cambridge, UK - think it dated from 1987 or earlier.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transputer says that the Inmos D700 Transputer Development System had a folding editor. That would have been in the early 1980s I think?
I haven't used org-mode, so I may be a bit unclear on exactly what is meant by folding editors. However, if we're talking about collapsing sections of text, I wonder if the oN-Line System (NLS) would qualify, as shown in Douglas Engelbart's 1968 "The Mother of All Demos" [1].
Wikipedia claims IBM’s SPF in 1974 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_folding#History), using indentation to identify blocks (one may call that cheating, as folding would break down if the code wasn’t indented consistently, but for 1974, I wouldn’t hold it against them)
This reminds me of TaskPaper, an excellent plain text todo list app for Mac that worked the same way. It's evolved since its early years, but you can still use the original v1 for free.
I'm using vim with text files already, and Pandoc for converting markdown into other formats as needed. Hard to imagine paying $30 for a worse editing experience that only works on Mac. Maybe I'm not representative of the target market?
FoldingText is minimal only in terms of its UI. Behind the scenes, it parses your document, allows folding, focusing, builds an internal structure that can be queried using a query language based on XPath, and allows modes (think plugins) like todo lists, calculator, and schedules.
Would be happy to answer any questions you have, and FoldingText comes with a trial so give it a shot to see how different it is.
FoldingText isn't really a "minimalistic live Markdown focus mode" app, it's a productivity app, closer to something like Emacs' org-mode. I have no doubt that org-mode is more powerful, if you're already living in Emacs. (I can use Emacs, but I just can't get into it as a way of life.)
But FT isn't really being actively developed anymore, AFAICT. The developer switched from working on TaskPaper to FoldingText and then switched back to TaskPaper. Before TaskPaper he was working on WriteRoom, which was a minimal Markdown app, and sometimes it comes back and sometimes it doesn't. TaskPaper is pretty neat, but when push comes to shove it could be implemented as an extension/package for nearly any competent text editor. (And in fact has for several, including Atom. Folding Text also existed as a plugin for Atom at one point.)
We're still working on FoldingText :)! However, a lot of that has been behind the scenes as we're working on a new version from the ground up. We're hoping to start private beta in a couple of months.
It will be a paid upgrade. I'm sure we can work out how to migrate our customers who have bought FoldingText recently, but, honestly, we still have to figure out these aspects. Right now, we're heads-down on getting the beta out :).
Also, while FT is in beta it will have a significant discount.
One of the developers of Foldingtext here. Man, I was blown away to find Foldingtext on the front page of Hacker News today :)!
We're working hard behind the scenes to release the next major version in beta. It'll add a bunch of things that we feel will take FoldingText to the next level. Follow us on twitter (@foldingtext | https://twitter.com/foldingtext) if you're interested to hear about FoldingText development.
P.S. For the Vim enthusiasts, I'm really pushing to get vim support in the upcoming FoldingText beta ;)
I’m really excited to hear it’s still under development. I’m a user and honestly thought it had been abandoned for TaskPaper. Looking forward to see what’s coming!
Jesse can speak to that, and while we did take a look at org-mode, I believe it was much later on. One of Jesse’s main inspirations was the Canon cat (ftp://ftp.apple.asimov.net/pub/apple_II/documentation/misc/jef_raskin/DTCJefRaskinDoc060.pdf) IIRC. Also, FoldingText was developed as the next generation platform which could be used to develop other text based applications, like TaskPaper by modifying the parser and other simple tweaks. So, in some ways it was the logical successor of TaskPaper.
I write a lot of documentation in markdown. If you could make this product handle images and file management (so I can make multiple pages and link them like a wiki) you'd have a lifelong customer.
I may be a bit late to this, but I used to have a kind of cool Textmate extension that would let me write comments (like this one) in Textmate. The extension wouldn't save to a local drive, but I thought it a nifty feature.
I had huge problems with Bear. It repeatedly lost files and text and behaved in several other totally unacceptable ways. Have you ever had this problem with it?
OK, that's really good to know. I haven't had that experience but perhaps it occurs when syncing? I've never used that feature (don't need it; free is fine for me).
Really neat, especially focus mode. I don’t think we’ve problem space of note taking plus outliners yet, so anything with a new twist is welcome (and all the more so if it doesn’t use any weird formats).
Wow this exactly the app I want :) I've been using IA Writer for as long as I can remember as my developer todo app. Having some more developer oriented features in the same format is perfect!
There is currently no support for adding media to documents, as they’re just plain text. It might be something we’ll consider moving forward with the new version.
The timers can be started by using the ‘schedule’ mode. Just add ‘.schedule’ to the end of a heading and then start adding time lines underneath. The video is getting dated now, time to re-record :)
I watched the demo and realized I didn't know how to collapse all org branches but current, so I glanced at the documentation but didn't see it. That would frequently be useful to me. I suppose you could cycle global to collapsed and then reopen the current?
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[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 118 ms ] threadThis is something we're trying to address with the upcoming beta. You can follow us on twitter: @foldingtext, to get news about the beta when we start rolling it out.
[2] app tree — https://pastebin.com/raw/URDzmRLJ
Less features but an excellent markdown editor for Mac, Windows, and Ubuntu
I'd be interested to know where folding editors first originated?
We have org-mode now of course.
My first encounter was 28 years ago now - December 1989 - an in-house editor called Teddy written by "Burkhard" that we had running on Vax - for Parasolid development in Cambridge, UK - think it dated from 1987 or earlier.
So folds in Emacs date from at least 1992.
* It could occasionally create corrupt folded files though, which was annoying if he checked them in to the SCM.
https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/folding.el
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJDv-zdhzMY&t=5m48s
I think the first "popular" ones were made by Dave Winer (http://davewiner.com). Here's a list of some (http://outliners.scripting.com)
I remember using MORE on the Mac in the late '80s.
https://www.taskpaper.com/
http://support.hogbaysoftware.com/t/where-can-i-download-old...
Would be happy to answer any questions you have, and FoldingText comes with a trial so give it a shot to see how different it is.
But FT isn't really being actively developed anymore, AFAICT. The developer switched from working on TaskPaper to FoldingText and then switched back to TaskPaper. Before TaskPaper he was working on WriteRoom, which was a minimal Markdown app, and sometimes it comes back and sometimes it doesn't. TaskPaper is pretty neat, but when push comes to shove it could be implemented as an extension/package for nearly any competent text editor. (And in fact has for several, including Atom. Folding Text also existed as a plugin for Atom at one point.)
Also, while FT is in beta it will have a significant discount.
We're working hard behind the scenes to release the next major version in beta. It'll add a bunch of things that we feel will take FoldingText to the next level. Follow us on twitter (@foldingtext | https://twitter.com/foldingtext) if you're interested to hear about FoldingText development.
P.S. For the Vim enthusiasts, I'm really pushing to get vim support in the upcoming FoldingText beta ;)
http://bear-writer.com
The timers can be started by using the ‘schedule’ mode. Just add ‘.schedule’ to the end of a heading and then start adding time lines underneath. The video is getting dated now, time to re-record :)