Tot, our tiny text companion, makes a lot of folks happy. But with any product, there are always requests for new features. In version 1.4, we’re happy to announce that we tackled our top two requests!
Smart Bullets
A lot of folks, including your humble developers, use Tot for lists. It’s a quick, easy, and unstructured way to keep track of things that need attention. So it makes sense to have a way to check things off in those lists, right?
Prior to today’s release, that wasn’t easy.
And all the solutions we looked at weren’t easy either. Adding in-line checkmarks like Notes was a move away from Tot’s superpower: handling plain text. The size of tap areas on iOS was also an issue: text tends to be a lot smaller than your finger (one of the reasons folks want a magnifier when selecting text).
But after several tries, we finally found a way to do it, and we’re calling the result “Smart Bullets”. These bullets are plain text, but the thing that makes them smart is that you can click or tap to change their state. And when you add a new bullet, it always starts unchecked and stays that way until you change it.
On macOS, you can add a smart bullet using the ✻ button at the bottom of the window. On iOS, you can setup the bullets using Quick Keys in Settings.
Based on our own use over the past month, this is one of those “how did I ever live without this?” features.
iOS Widgets
Dots on your Home Screen? Finally.
The widgets come in two flavors:
- The Multi-dot layout shows a short summary for each dot.
- The Single dot layout shows a single dot that you can configure by tapping and holding, then selecting Edit Widget.
Both layouts come in a variety of sizes to match your needs. The heading for the widget comes from your first line of text. The body comes from any subsequent lines.
With the release of support of Shortcuts in the last Tot release, you now have a place on your Home Screen that can be automated with text! One of our beta testers is using the Tot widget for a quote of the day, but you could use it to display system status, the number of days until Christmas, or whatever you can dream up!
(If you want to play around with the Quote of the Day shortcut, you can download it from iCloud. Be aware that it replaces the contents of one of your dots, so proceed with caution!)
And More…
There are bunch of other minor improvements like opening links directly in the app on iOS, improved pointer interactions on iPadOS, and a new Paste and Match Style on macOS. See the product website for a full list of changes.
If you’re new to Tot, you can check out the product website or download a FREE copy today for your Mac. A paid version is also available on iOS.
