First Lettera Beta update is here! We’ve been heads down working through your feedback, and this update brings a good batch of it to life. Here’s what stands out most, with the full changelog at the bottom for anyone who wants every detail.
Now you can shape how Lettera looks and feels to match how you write. Choose your favorite font, change font size, line height, paragraph spacing, and more.
Turn this on and Lettera keeps your active line fixed in the center of the screen as you type, so the text scrolls up rather than your eyes scrolling down, perfect for longer writing sessions.
You can now write Mermaid diagrams in Lettera. Just add mermaid after the opening code fence and the diagram renders live below it.
Major improvements
In addition to new features, we also went back through some of the small frictions you came across during testing.
The workspace folder name now stands out clearly at the top of the sidebar, so you always know where you are at a glance. Dropping a folder into the sidebar now gives you a clearer hover state, so it feels more obvious and intentional. And we added shortcut hints right on the opening page, to help you find your way around without digging through menus.
More feedback welcome!
We are so grateful for all the feedback you have sent us. We are reading every bit of it, and working hard to make Lettera better. More is on the way, so stay tuned, and thank you for trying Lettera. You are all awesome!
Your writing starts with Lettera.
The Lettera Team
Full changelog (4091)
New
Typography and general settings
Mermaid diagram support
Typewriter mode
Improvements
Editing the same file in multiple windows now updates instantly across all of them
Rename and “Move to…” are now available for files inside folders
Improved UX when dropping a folder into the sidebar
The workspace folder name now stands out more clearly at the top of the sidebar
Improved the table of contents’ visual hierarchy
Renaming now gives clearer feedback on invalid names
Added a preference to disable automatic sorting of to dos
Shortcut ⌘ N now creates a new untitled file in a new window when no folder is open
Fixes
Fixed a selection bug in the sidebar
Fixed an auto save bug related to multiple windows
Fixed the to do reordering animation
Fixed the rename field in the sidebar showing white text when the app moved to the background and back
The red highlight is now actually red (it was orange)
Thanks for the update! Especially the typewriter mode which seems to work smooth so far.
To be honest, that so-called improvement confused me totally. “To open the folder in Lettera” now means to open it in the same window inside of a new tab. In the previous version only (sub)folders from the same workspace could be open in the same window (by context menu). That breaks a clear mental model which separates different workspaces in different windows. With that new model the confusion just arises. People could ask for example: Why does opening from main menu -> file -> open ... doesn’t open likewise the new folder inside a tab. There’s a lack of consistency here.
My very first expectation was that the folder dragged from the Finder would be moved or by using the shift key copied, as indicated in the dialog box. Another confusion was: Why using the shift key for copying files from finder and not the usual option key.
If you want Lettera to be a 1:1 mirroring of the file system, then I have to say that this is a horrible solution. Dropping a folder onto the sidebar shouldn’t never mean NOT to copy or move it into the filesystem displayed in the sidebar. The criticism leveled at 1:1 mirroring was not based on confusion. The argument has always been that other programs were cited as supposed models. As a regular user with no special knowledge, I understood the concept right away. The criticism wasn’t that Lettera’s concept was confusing, but that a few vocal users wanted a different concept.
A dialog box would have been enough to let the user know what is about to happen, namely that the folder would be moved in the Finder. Additionally to it a hint that using the option key as identifier would copy rather than moving would have been a useful feature, fully compliant how dragging and dropping works in Mac finder.* I think the current approach is less clear than before and more confusing.
Forget the part (written in italic). Actually no dialog box is necessary. The way I described it, is not possible. Maybe at the very first dropping after installation a warning would make sense.
I think I agree here. When I dropped a folder onto the sidebar, I didn’t anticipate that folder becoming the only workspace (I didn’t even notice the text that instructed me to hold Shift to copy). What I anticipated was that the folder I dropped in would become part of the workspace in which I was already working.
A small clarification first: tabs and windows are equivalent, you can drag a tab out and it becomes a window, and vice versa. And even in the previous version you could have mixed folders and files in the same window. That’s partly due to how tabs behave on macOS and partly a deliberate choice on our side: it’s very handy to have access to multiple folders/files in one window. So the consistency you’re after is actually preserved!
We agree on the principle, but we got a lot of feedback and the confusion was real. Because people were mistaking Lettera for a workspace-based app rather than a document-based one, they assumed that dropping into the sidebar just created an alias of the file/folder (the correct green “+” badge was there on the drop, but it was being ignored). So this update is our attempt at a solution to that confusion, which, trust me, existed.
Beyond the overlay, we also made it clearer that the sidebar represents a folder, by tweaking the root folder’s icon and UI. We don’t think everything will stay exactly as it is today, but we wanted a quick fix to prevent the misunderstanding for now.
Lettera is a very new and fast-evolving app, we’ve had an enormous amount of feedback, and we’re working through it one step at a time.
Nice to have typewriter mode! I notice that if you attempt to select a word near the top or bottom of the screen by double-clicking, you can’t do it when in Typewriter mode, as the cursor jumps (correctly) to the middle of the screen. Or am I missing something?
The root folder icon is a good tweak and provides clarity. I think what’s less obvious is the option to Hold Shift while dropping the file.
In addition to that option being too subtle in its presentation, I expected the default behavior to be “copy to this folder”. Holding Shift, in my view, would be better suited if you wanted to open the entire folder in Lettera, since (at least for me) that would be the less common action.
Glad to see this change, because copying folders was really not ideal. But it’s not persistent. If I drag a folder, it opens a new tab with the contents of that folder in the sidebar. I’d rather have these folders available from the sidebar at any time.
That’s not an option at the moment (unless you want to copy/move them). The sidebar is just a representation of the folder you’ve opened, so anything you do there is the same that as in the Finder.
One example: I have screenshots or images in a folder which isn’t the same one as my text files. I want to add images to a file. I can’t do that easily without switching to the Finder. If I could have the screenshots folder and the text file folder visible in the sidebar, then I could work more fluently with these different files.
I think this is especially important given that Lettera displays images, which many markdown editors don’t do; they only display the file paths and the markdown image code.
Let me just say that I really like the way it looks now that I can choose my own fonts, line spacing, etc. I hadn’t realized how relaxing it can be to write in markdown without all the code visible.
It’s not confusing at all. You just want Lettera to work in a different way than it does. I don’t mean this rudely, but you can’t expect someone else to build an app just for you. If some of your well-established workflows can’t be transferred completely, then it’s only natural that you adapt those workflows to the new app to some extent. If you don’t want to or can’t do that, then the app probably isn’t the right fit for you, even if it offers a lot of features that appeal to you. iA Writer is a great tool. Choosing either this app or Lettera means making trade-offs in both cases. What you’re willing to give up is ultimately your decision. There won’t be iA writer with Lettera’s wysiwyg editor or Lettera with iA Writer’s organizer. You could at least try to focus on the outcome you want to achieve rather than insisting on a specific implementation that would break the current design. And I think it’s entirely possible to achieve what you’re after within the existing concept, without abandoning the idea of 1:1 mirroring.
Consistency has been compromised in so far that it is now possible to open a folder from the Finder via drag-and-drop into a window that’s already open. The old concept was that (1.) only individual files could be opened from the Finder (2.) in a separate window without a sidebar. Now, however, “Open” means that the folder is sometimes opened in a separate window and sometimes in the active window, depending on how you open it. If you’ve already wanted for the sake of clarity that a file opened from the iCloud folder doesn’t have a sidebar, then you can’t allow a folder opened via drag-and-drop to appear in the active window, while a folder opened from the main menu appears in its own window.
It may be that some people were confused, but even that comes from the fact that they wanted a completely different way of working, namely one that, with the help of alias links, would allow them to access multiple folders side by side from within Lettera in a single window. As far as I can see that’s exactly the workflow some people are looking for: (1.) having access to multiple folders located in different parts of the file system (2.) within the same Lettera window.
That’s a completely legitimate and attractive workflow. And I believe it could also be implemented in Lettera without creating any inconsistencies. You would need an optional distinction between a single-window mode and a multi-window mode. Let me quickly suggest a possible concept as a source of inspiration:
Both modes would have a feature to make an opened folder a favorite one. These favorite folder could then be opened from the sidebar. There are many forms of ui-implementation. While I would prefer a toolbar icon (like in the screenshots of the panda sneak peek preview), a drop-down menu would also be an option. These favorite folders ARE the alias links or at least have the same function. You could even pair them with main menu entries and hotkeys.
But here is where the two modes would differ:
In single-window mode all folders and files are always opened in their own tab, regardless of whether you use the main menu to open them or click on a single file in the Finder. The latter would be displayed in its own tab without a sidebar. This way you would be working in a single window. And that is something the critics desire as well. Opening a new window would then only be possible if you explicitly choose it from the context menu of a file or folder in the sidebar. That would be comparable to Bear, which also operates in a single-window mode, yet still provides the option to open individual notes in a separate window. Nevertheless a single-window mode means that there is this one main window.
In multi-window mode by contrast everything opens in its own window, whether it’s a file clicked in the Finder or a folder/file opened from the main menu. Even favourite folders that are opened (from a toolbar icon f.e.) are displayed in a separate window, similar to how it works in Obsidian. Opening a new tab would then only be possible if you explicitly choose it from the context menu of a file or folder in the sidebar. And not to forget: a multi window mode wouldn’t need the nagging dialogue and modifier when a file/folder is dropped onto the sidebar.
[Edit] Another inconsistency: While dragging a folder over the sidebar shows the info dialogue, doing so with a file doesn’t show it.
@krssno I do agree it doesn’t behave like my experience using Finder. I would prefer the sidebar be a 1:1 with Finder and for the most part it is but how you create that sidebar is the challenge.
There’s also a decision on if the app is to be a multi document interface or single and I may be over using those definitions. A single doc interface would have a single frame/window that all UX interactions behave in. Multi-doc is what I’m seeing and both have their place, it’s also much easier to implement which in this case the Folder is what starts it all. When you open a Folder whether it be by dragging or directly opening, it either opens in a new window or ends up in the sidebar. The dragging part is what complicates the story though.
What do we really want. Keeping the implementation of Lettera simple is something I believe is the goal and simple is hard.
As I play with it more I see a number of areas that behave inconsistently and I’ll begin providing more feedback in other posts. e.g. when I open a file from the menu it opens a new window with no sidebar…not a fan.
Personally my default action would be as follows:
Opening a Folder displays the folder in the sidebar (happens today)
Dragging a folder into the sidebar should simply be a pointer to another root folder
this means there’s only one window but all my folders exist in the sidebar (more complex)
also means this behavior is NOT like Finder for good reason
Finder copies folders between disks (iCloud, external drives)
Finder moves folders when dragging from one location to another on the same disk
Opening a file should open in a new tab
that complicates the sidebar because the file may not be in the same folder
As I write the above I realize this makes the implementation much more complicated so forget all that. I’m back to opening a folder opens a new Window with all the subfolders present if they exist, like it does right now. My mental model changes but I’d rather understand and accept the implementation and focus on writing.
Knowing this, I’m not sure I’d even bother with dragging folders to the sidebar and use Finder to organize the top level folders then open each Folder as needed.
If I have multiple windows open, I can click on the Window->Merge All Windows all my Windows come together under one Window and all the tabs display accordingly. What’s also nice is when I click on a Tab the sidebar changes to correspond with the file in the tab. So, liking that model.
I don’t like that opening a file creates a window without a sidebar but I can see the need. The sidebar can always be hidden so I’m not sure why the difference other than it’s simpler. I try to keep that in mind but sometimes easy to think ahead even though I haven’t used it long enough to know what I’d like and not like. So less might be more at least in version 1.
That I have yet to see work. I only see one parent or workspace/root folder. If I open a Folder it creates a new Window and same behavior if I drag a folder.
I have yet to see two “workspace” folders live in the sidebar. As much as I’d like to see it, I fear it will complicate your sidebar especially when you’re basically implementing a mini-Finder in the sidebar which I’m not sure you want to take on, at least not in v1.x.
I’ve been wanting that too so I work out of one window with many tabs but I found that if I use the built-in MacOS “Window->Merge All Windows” capability, it brings all the tabs into the one window frame and when I click on the tab the sidebar changes. Maybe that’s a interim solution or permanent depending on how you implement it meaning can I have a App Setting that lets me pick the default behavior or I can use what’s already there, user choice.
Especially the typewriter mode which seems to work smooth so far.
