Hi Carl, Wonderful! - The notes pane on the left now lists all text-like file types, not just > markdown (.md) files a/k/a notes. > For someone starting out, it makes sense to put all note files in the `notes` directory. Given your labeling system, there is no need to make any subdirectories, and it is appropriate to list all notes in the notes pane. But for someone with an elaborate existing directory structure who wants to use the system to edit existing files, it might be nice if that pane were a listing of all the text-like files in the current working directory (which might or might not be the `notes` directory). For me, it would be good for 'text-like' to include files without any extension, because most of my (XyWrite) files are like that (sorry, Windows). Here's how I find and open a file in XyWrite: I have an XPL program loaded on Alt-s (for "switch") that accepts the first key pressed and switches to the directory associated with that key in a look-up list. For example, Alt-s and then 'p' switches to \xy\pers; Alt-s and then space puts up the look-up list in case I've forgotten what goes where. Then I press Alt-F1, which initiates your "Directory Manager", so that typically in one or two more keystrokes I have the file I want. Does QPL allow scripts to respond to user input in the way that my directory-switching program does? I have played around a bit with QPL and have skimmed Chapter 8, and my conclusion is that it probably doesn't. The work done by "Directory Manager" would be replaced by a mouse click. - It's now possible to select the font and type size for editor, markdown > preview, and PDF printout. Each is independent of the others. > Very nice! > - There is a new menu option to sync the preview-panel view with the > editor view. There are wrinkles, and it may or may not be useful in > practice -- I haven't tested it extensively -- but it's there. > They scroll together nicely, but if you go to the end of the file, then when you start typing the preview jumps back to the top of the file. I can imagine that keeping the preview scrolled so that the text the user is editing is in view is difficult. (BaKoMa --- a wonderful editor for LaTeX files --- achieves it, but its design is a bit different: one can enter text in either the preview window or the source window.) A large number of my files contain information that I want to be able to consult, and occasionally update. When I consult them, it's good to look at the formatted versions of them. So for me it would be good to have an option under which the Preview fills the edit-preview pane, and a toggle key to split the screen, with the edit pane on the left and the preview on the right, so that I could make some changes and then toggle back to full-window Preview. Sort of like switching to expanded mode and back in XyWrite (except that in that case editing is possible in both modes, and you don't see the source and preview side-by-side when editing). However, it is easy to come up with suggestions like that --- and you want to keep Quicknotes lightweight. So give it some thought only if it sounds like something that you would find useful. - In Dark mode, the entire screen is darkened -- except the menu bar. I > explored including the latter with Claude, and he explained at length why > Notepad++ can do it but Python can't. Well, in fact, he said that Python > can, but it involves using a different paradigm for rendering the menu bar, > and the discussion didn't leave me super-confident about the outcome, so I > balked. That said ... > I've been in situations with LLMs that sound similar. I think you're right to have balked! - ... there is now a menu option to "Auto-hide the menu bar". When enabled, > you can toggle the menu bar on and off by hitting the Alt key. There are > also corresponding commands: SMB, CMB, TMB -- to Show, Clear, and Toggle > the menu bar. > When I click "Auto-hide menu bar" the script crashes. When I restart it, the menu bar is hidden. I can reveal it by pressing Alt and then clicking somewhere. or by pressing Alt twice. Here are a couple of questions and another idea. - Do you have a nice desktop icon for Quicknotes, to use for a shortcut? - The target in my shortcut is C:\Windows\py.exe \quicknotes\quicknotes.py That opens Quicknotes and also a small blank DOS window. That's perfectly fine, but I'm wondering whether there is a better way to proceed. - The idea --- not a feature request, but just something to possibly consider if it sounds attractive: user-defined Markdown formatting. Those notes in which I record information I may want to consult in the future are all currently in XyWrite. They typically have a bunch of sections, each with a heading. I use different modes for the headings and subheadings, which therefore display in different colors. Some of these modes are intended for italics, boldface, etc., but I am never going to print these files or create pdfs from them --- I just view them, so it doesn't matter what the modes mean. I just use the colors because they stand out and make the files easy to navigate visually. (I like MD144 and MD151, for example.) So I would like to control what # Heading and ## Subheading look like when previewed: how much space above and below, font size, font color, background color. I attach Chapter 6 of your manual with a few comments on it. (It's not the most recent version, but I think this chapter hasn't changed.) Of course don't hesitate to ignore suggestions you're not interested in implementing! Martin -- Martin J. Osborne https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/osborne <http://www.economics.utoronto.ca/osborne>
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