Tap, hold, drag & pinch
Everything on the sky — the home view of your entries — is done with a tap, a hold, a drag or a pinch. Each one does one thing.
At a glance
| you do | what happens |
|---|---|
| tap a star | its card opens, with a light tick and a note pitched by the star's month |
| tap empty sky | a small spark, nothing kept. With a card open, the tap only closes the card |
| hold empty sky | a new star — a new, blank entry — is placed on that day, at that height |
| hold a star | the star lifts on the hold itself and follows your finger; let go to file it on the day and height under your finger |
| drag through the sky | each star announces itself as you reach it — a click, a note, its title and its card |
| rest on a star | with "dwell to select" on, its card opens without lifting |
| drag along the dotted path | turns the year |
| two fingers | zoom in and out |
Place a star
- Hold your finger still on an empty part of the sky — the open band between the header and the year's path.
- After the hold delay a firm tick lands, and a new star is placed under your finger.
- Its card opens: "a new star" with the day, "not written yet", and "write it", "connect it", "leave it loose" and "take it back". See A star's card.
- A hold on the year's path places nothing, and two fingers never place.
- Close the card any other way and the star stays, loose — in no journal. A just-placed loose star wears a dashed ring until you move on.
- With journal gold, a journal whose gravity claims the new entry files it (Gold) — never a journal that is closed, put away or locked. See Gravity & a journal's template (Gold).
A new star never vanishes. If "loose" is switched off in the journals short list, it comes back on and the line says "loose stars are back on the sky". If a switched-off journal's gravity took the new star, that journal comes back on: "“‹name›” back on the sky". Either way there is "undo", which switches it off again; the star is still kept. See Journals on the sky.
Carry a star to another day
- Hold a finger still on a star for the hold delay. It lifts with a firm tick and the line "carrying it — let go to file it here" — your finger doesn't have to move.
- Slide it if you like. The star follows your finger.
- Let go. The day under your finger becomes the day it is filed on, and the height becomes its new height. The line says "filed on ‹day›". Let go without moving and it is filed where your finger is.
- Drag past a small distance before the hold delay is up, or put a second finger down, and it doesn't lift.
- A back swipe from the edge of the screen files nothing.
- When it was written stays the same.
- The height you give it is kept everywhere the star is drawn — the sky, its journal's page, the constellation widget, the journal's plate and its signature. A star from another app moves as freely as your own. Echoes — last year's hollow stars on today's line — can't be picked up.
It has to be a hold: a plain drag through the sky is how stars are heard and felt.
Drag through the sky
Slide a finger through the open sky and each star announces itself as you reach it, so the sky can be read by touch and sound.
- You feel a click as you reach a star, and over it a soft bumpiness, stronger the more the entry carries — words, pages, files, tags and ties each add a little. Over empty sky you feel nothing.
- You hear the note of its month.
- You see the star swell, with its title riding above it — or below, with the suite's star labels set "below". With "magnifier" on it swells much more.
- Its title is read aloud while "spoken labels" is on.
- Its card opens at the bottom. Letting go keeps the card of the last star you rested on.
A drag that starts on the year's path turns the year instead.
Rest on a star
With settings › "ease" › "dwell to select" on, rest your finger on a star and a ring closes round it. When it closes you hear and feel the select cue, and its card opens, saying "chosen by resting on it." It starts off; "dwell time (seconds)" sets how long, from 0.4 to 2.5, starting at 0.9.
Pinch
Spread two fingers to see fewer days, closer; pinch them to see more. The sky runs from a fortnight across, where a day is wide enough to place a star exactly, out to three years. A pinch never places a star. The zoom lasts while the app is open; next time, the sky opens at about four months again.
Latched buttons and "tap" navigation
With settings › "ease" › "latched buttons" on — or the suite's navigation set to "tap" — a star you touch stays chosen after you lift. While its card is open, the bottom-right corner gains:
- ‹ "back" — "step back": closes the card.
- ◉ "open" — "open it": plays the select cue and opens the entry to read.
Touching stars works the same either way.
Make it easier
All in settings › "ease": "hold delay (seconds)" (0.2 to 2.5, starting at 0.5), "touch target size", "magnifier", "spoken labels", "haptics", "scrub texture", "dwell to select" and "latched buttons". See Ease.
See also.
A star's card · The sky · Turn the year & go to today · Ease