Navigating pages is similar to linking them. That means a branch of your canvas can terminate in an image, but you cannot connect a text or another image page from an image. Another limitation is that image pages can be linked to from text pages but cannot serve as link anchors themselves. There are no markup or other image editing tools, although that sort of editing could be accomplished before adding an image to Coppice. Image page editing is limited to modifying the image’s title and adding a text description. It’s also worth noting that image pages play a distinctly secondary role to text in Coppice. The behavior is consistent with the way Coppice is designed, but I think most users wouldn’t expect a duplicate page to appear. That leaves you with a new standalone text page that is unconnected to any others, plus a second linked instance. For example, if you create a new text page on the canvas and then select text in another text page and link it to the first page, a new instance of your first text page appears. The separation between instances of a page on the canvas and in the sidebar has another effect. That’s a structure I like for most use cases, but it might not work for you if you’re looking for an app that accommodates a more free-form structure. By duplicating pages on the canvas instead of creating multiple links pointing to the same page, Coppice’s approach is similar to a traditional mind-map or outline. Second, the approach has a fundamental impact on the structure of every canvas you create. First, your sidebar won’t get cluttered with duplicate pages, and editing a page in one place, means the edits will appear in every instance on the canvas. As a result, the App Debuts text page appears twice on the canvas but only once in Coppice’s sidebar. For example, I’ve linked a text page called App Debuts in two other text pages. Pages can be linked as many times as you’d like on your canvas, which causes the page to appear multiple times on your canvas, but not in the sidebar. The App Debut notes displayed at the bottom of this screenshot are one page, but show up twice on the canvas because the page is linked from two other pages. As a result, if your list of pages is longer than fits in the view, you’ll need to use search or scroll with a mouse or trackpad instead of the arrow keys. One limitation of linking that I discovered is that the page list that pops up when you type ⌘L doesn’t scroll using the arrow keys. Coppice can also auto-generate links if you’re a paid subscriber simply by including the title of a page in another page. ![]() From here, you can search for a text or image page by name or scroll through the list of pages in your document to find the one to which you want to link.Īnother way to create a page link is to highlight some text and select ‘Create New Linked Page’ from the Page menu, where you can create a new empty text or image page. There are multiple ways to link from one text page to another, but I’ve found that the simplest is to highlight some text on a page and use the keyboard shortcut (⌘L), which opens a heads-up display that reminds me of Alfred. The greatest power of the canvas, though, is the ability to link pages together. Each text page on the canvas can be resized to accommodate your text, dragged around the canvas into a position that suits your needs, and closed to help you focus on one part of your canvas. You can add pages to the canvas several ways, including by dragging them out of the sidebar. Linking to another page displays a HUD of available pages. However, despite some limitations, Coppice is an excellent addition to the genre that succeeds in offering a novel perspective on note-taking and research in a crowded field. ![]() There are ways that I think Coppice could enhance its approach to extend the app’s power. It’s into this app frontier that M Cubed Software launched Coppice, a Mac-only app that combines elements of mind mapping and note-taking to deliver a unique, note card-like experience. The category has become a playground of creativity, allowing developers to experiment with new ways to help users explore ideas free from the more constrained, structured environment of a text editor. ![]() The approaches vary as widely as the ways people process and organize their thoughts, which is what makes these apps so interesting. There are note-taking apps, many of which offer wiki-style back-linking, outliners, diagramming apps, mind mapping apps, and more. ![]() Apps that help you organize and connect ideas aren’t new, but it’s a hot category right now.
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