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Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

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Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#201

Post by kitsunesoba »

moonlighter wrote: post #107
yazriel wrote: post #54

Why oh why do people still write standard GUI applications in non-portable platform ?! Its a mystery to me

There are benefits to having a pure, native app. Quiver starts literally instantaneously without any lag, partly because it's less than 5MB(!) in size. Here's a good read from the author: http://yaoganglian.com/2015/11/21/Quiver-3/

Yep. Speaking specifically about developing for OS X only vs. multiplatform, there are big tradeoffs to be made by taking multiplatform options outright. In my eyes, nothing is as great for UI-centric desktop application development as Obj-C/Swift paired with Cocoa/AppKit. It just works so well, and though Qt is probably the best of native multiplatform solutions it’s still not comparable.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#202

Post by st3v3r »

lhc- wrote: post #192
coldtea wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Errr, isn't traditionally the seller that decides, if, when and for how long they want to sell their wares?

But in this case, the buyer already purchased the product.

And lost it, and was looking for a replacement.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#203

Post by song »

jsjohnst wrote: post #25
song wrote: post #24

That looks very good, I just wish I could buy it outside of the mac app store. I really dislike buying for the app store and much prefer buying directly from the company...

Can you explain why? Curious as this differs from most people I've seen.

Sorry hadn't seen your message earlier. Everyone pretty much covered it but basically I have multiple reasons why:

- an app on the app store can be pulled out at any moment.

- I can't backup a specific version of the software that I like (I've seen before software become overly bloated in future versions forcing me to keep using an older version)

- I do not want to support Apple's policies on the app store and do not want to ever end up having a system that's as restricted as IOS (although if that happens I'd jump ship back to Linux so I guess my non app store purchases would become useless anyway)

- my experience with ios app store reviews told me that Apple rules are idiotic, the review experience is poorly managed and they don't give a fuck about keeping developers happy now that iphones are massively successful (very different than when they were trying to court developers back in 2005ish...). I don't want my money to help finance this with the 30% cut that Apple takes.

It all really boils to control, being able to keep backup of the software I use, having access to that software even if the developer stops selling it for whatever reason. I dislike the fact that end users have less and less control over the platform they buy and I do not want to be part of that.

I'm a tad hypocritical since I use a mac and I have an iphone lying around to test and software dev on but buying on the app store is where I draw the line.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#204

Post by ytjohn »

This looks really awesome, will test it out. I like that they let you download the trial. Don't like you have to go into the Apple Store to buy the app.

There is an app called Dash[1] that has a lot of source code and api documentation stored offline and searchable. It also boasts that you can put your own code snippets in it. So I really wanted to use Dash to keep all my code snippets in, as well as the documentation lookup feature. But adding code snippets to Dash is a somewhat involved process, and I eventually gave up on using it as a notebook. But it might be interesting to see about converting the freely downloadable docsets into something readable by Quiver. This might not be easily doable since these docsets are in a myriad of formats, and quiver only supports markdown and latex currently. Adding reStructured text would probably open up some possibilities.

https://kapeli.com/dash

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#205

Post by brazzledazzle »

cogwheel wrote: post #144
brazzledazzle wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought you were being overly negative but perhaps had a point about HN. But this is all over the guy's sales pitch on his product page? You're reading way too much into it. It's one thing to complain about a monoculture in a community but another thing entirely to expect a product page to laden itself with anything except for pitching a product as best it can.

Huh? No, it's not about that. Not sure where you got this idea, given my other responses.

Actually I made the comment before that change. But I think I understand why I interpreted your statement that way. The software's page itself says "The Programmer's Notebook" as the page's subtitle and the software's tagline. Presumably whoever submitted it (unless it's the author) probably copied and pasted it. Sorry about that.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#206

Post by omaranto »

tomsmeding wrote: post #186

Says it supports LaTeX, and then admits it won't do anything but math mode. That isn't LaTeX, that's TeX. The "La-" isn't there for nothing.

No, but it supports LaTeX math mode commands, such as \frac, that are not in plain TeX (in plain TeX $1 + \frac{a+b}{c+d}$ is written $1 + {{a+b} \over {c+d}}$ --but you might be able to omit one set of braces).

I don't see any reason for people to avoid the LaTeX additions to mathmode.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#207

Post by omaranto »

arijun wrote: post #156
seagreen wrote: post #89

The more I read about different applications, the more I think you can't understand them unless you look at the underlying data format. Here's Quiver's: https://github.com/HappenApps/Quiver/wiki/Quiver-Data-Format It's . . . really good. Like, _really_ good. I particularly like that they keep the metadata and the content of the note separate. This is the same thing Camlistore does, and it's nice for version control b…

This seems remarkably similar to the Jupyter (IPython) notebook format [0]. The only big difference I can see is the separate metadata file, which I'm not so sure is a plus (since it adds the complexity of needing each notebook to be a folder). [0] https://ipython.org/ipython-doc/3/notebook/nbformat.html

Right, but Jupyter lets you evaluate the code, which is much cooler than just editing it. On the other hand, Quive may have better search functionality.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#208

Post by st3v3r »

andystanton wrote: post #171
jsjohnst wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain why? Curious as this differs from most people I've seen.

I like the ability to install apps from the Homebrew Cask Tap [1] to automate my laptop setup where possible. Apps that are only available in the App Store aren't usually installable this way. [1] https://github.com/caskroom/homebrew-cask

True, but they're usually easy enough to install themselves.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#209

Post by moonlighter »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #201
moonlighter wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are benefits to having a pure, native app. Quiver starts literally instantaneously without any lag, partly because it's less than 5MB(!) in size. Here's a good read from the author: http://yaoganglian.com/2015/11/21/Quiver-3/

Yep. Speaking specifically about developing for OS X only vs. multiplatform, there are big tradeoffs to be made by taking multiplatform options outright. In my eyes, nothing is as great for UI-centric desktop application development as Obj-C/Swift paired with Cocoa/AppKit. It just works so well, and though Qt is probably the best of native multiplatform solutions it’s still not comparable.

Exactly. I used another note taking app, aptly named "Notebooks" (http://www.notebooksapp.com), which is built with Qt. It's cross platform, open data format, and while it sort of looks and feels almost like a native app, it just doesn't compare to a true native app like Quiver.

Re: Quiver: Programmer's Notebook for OS X

#210

Post by st3v3r »

oxryly1 wrote: post #190
bubblicious wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a software engineer, I'm always baffled by this reaction... It's $10, less than what I just paid for lunch. Have we completely lost the value of good software?

(Also a software engineer) Yes, we've probably lost the value of good software a bit. The bigger issue is that I no longer judge the value of software based purely on a page (or app store description) advertising it. I need to try it out to see its value. So if the company is charging up front for the software, just about any amount seems too much.

They have a free trial available.
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