CodeMacLife

Another great article. I’ve recently bought a MacBook Air M1 after many years with Windows. I can honestly say it has been the best decision I’ve made in a long time. I’m using as many Apple apps as possible over 3rd-party choices. The way my Mac integrates with my iPhone, iPad and Watch is spectacular.

Evernote Challenge 2023? I QUIT

I think I saw this coming but Bending Spoons’ acquisition of Evernote has been rocky. In a recent report, the rest of Evernote team has been released from the company.

I made the decision last month to quit Evernote after I made the claim I would spend the whole year using the app service. I genuinely thought it was a good choice after listening to Francesco D'Alessio and Tiago Forte talk about Evernote as a Second Brain.

Read my original Evernote post here.

What I didn’t know has how bad Evernote was going to be until I used it for six months. I mostly used Evernote across my Windows PC, iPhone, iPad and Chromebook.

The iPad and iPhone experience was OK, but only OK. Like many others, I experienced many sync issues. This was fine at first because I could be patient. However, as time went by and my notes grew, the performance and reliability became unacceptable.

One evening, when I gathering a lot of material, content and media for a significant WordPress migration at work, my Evernote app on my Windows PC crashed. I restarted the application and it was there. I checked my iPhone and the notes I had made weren’t.

I ignored the issue for a week until I noticed the notes were gone from my Windows PC too! By this time, my company had migrated to a new WordPress instance. I had lost everything I needed to restore blogs, pages and important content for the new website launch. I should have made copies elsewhere.

My conversation and ticket with Evernote did not help. Nothing could be retrieved.

After this event, I lost all trust in Evernote. I continued with Evernote, but only with clipping articles and pictures for later viewing. I switched to UpNote and life was so much better. Upnote has colour syntax and code blocks, which is miles better than Evernote for a start. The lifetime price of £25 made it a clear winner.

Dire Chromebook experience

The Chromebook experience was the accelerant to my departure. The Android app was awful. It was buggy. Evernote claimed the app was optimised for Chromebooks. However, I found it was a stretched tablet app with poor performance, features and weird quirks with the stylus. Merge was missing too.

I tried the Linux AppImage for Evernote. It performed a lot better than the Android app. Unfortunately, the community around the Linux app became quiet. Then I saw a comment online that stated the Linux offering was winding down, which would explain a lot.

I resorted to using the web client on my Chromebook. This completely missed the point of using Evernote. I needed offline access with my job that demands I work in places with no internet connectivity. I ended up adding things to my Google Keep app instead.

The Vision for Bending Spoons?

I knew things wouldn’t end well for me when Bending Spoons set their vision on AI and features I was not interested in.

I am not interested what they were suggesting. I had a snag list of things I had experienced over my six months of use. The only positive was synchronisation had “improved”. I say that loosely. What I mean is I had to start a note on my Windows PC, open that note on my iPhone and the collaboration feature would force the changes across both devices, thus forcing the information to transfer in real-time. Not ideal really.

What I really wanted to see from Evernote was the following:

• A sync button on the desktop.
• A rebuild of sketches with more drawing tools.
• Improved PDF annotation with more tools to edit and comment.
• Reliable calendar integration (not disappearing events).
• Markdown
• Double brackets to start backlinking
• Backlinking that made sense.
• Deeper folders.
• Colour syntax for coding (trust me, syntax is important).
• USI stylus support for Chromebooks without spiking, palm rejection and Penoval rubber support. My Nebo app on the same Chromebook didn’t the this issue.
• Tap on handwritten notes to convert to text.

Above all of these requests, I wanted the price to remain competitive. Instead, Bending Spoons went for a price point that made my eyes water. I could not stay with Evernote when Upnote offered so much more and it was reliable.

So, this is it. Goodbye Evernote. I made a mistake going with the app, but I have learnt a lot a long the way, especially about the importance of accessibility and quick capture.

I will post more in the future about my note-taking experience. There’s a lot that has happened over the last six months.

Please remember to subscribe to my Medium account. It helps me out massively. Thank you.

I have Apple Music through Apple One family subscription. My wife and son love it. I’m using more than ever and curating my own playlists since I bought a Mac.

I’m in the 300 camp. Since Twitter is useless for me right now, I’m going to pause my access to it until the limits are removed.

Oh nice. You should have fun writing on that.

Excellent news. I’ll look forward to your content. I saw you got a Chromebook as you mentioned it on your Twos list. Which one did you get?

These are exactly the same reasons why I have gone back to Apple Notes. The iOS17 / MacOS 14 update will add note linking, which will be amazing to use.

I started to use Arc Browser today and I love it! Learning the keyboard shortcuts is a must.

Thanks for sharing. I’m sure they will get there eventually.

Dave, you are a legend! Well done on your achievement. It’s nice to hear you are going to use the money to help your wife.

Nice article. Can you manage tasks from the Garmin watch?

You’ve touched on some good points. It is a big update. I’m looking forward to the health changes. I just hope they have improved the cycling monitoring. I can do an hour bike ride up some hilly areas and my Apple Watch records 7 minutes of exercise, which is odd because I am exhausted after the bike ride.

Thanks. I am excited. One day I will have just as many posts as you have now. I won't be taking part in the #66write like you. That's crazy! But seriously though, you have done amazing with it.

A new website for a new beginning

Last week, I announced I was sunsetting Minimlr and starting something new. That ‘new’ was CodeMacLife. Yesterday, I finally published my new website codemaclife.com where I will be starting afresh.

Some previous blog posts from minimlr.com will make it onto this website. I will be selective and choose what is relevant. My actions to dip in and out of social, blogging and the general inconsistencies I have chosen has meant I have lost a lot of followers and engagement. I totally understand. Why invest time with someone who randomly disappears and ‘re-invents’ themselves if things don’t go well.

Commitment and consistency

I am committing to a 5-year plan that will be myself committing to my ‘personal brand’ (whatever that means). I’m not going anywhere. I am running a personal blog, not a brand. This is going to be a slow burn project where I will learn to love writing again. Writing is a tedious thought but I know consistency will help me learn to enjoy the artistic craft of capturing the reader’s imagination and thoughts.

A new colour palette

When I say new, I am really saying I have added a bit of colour to my website (one colour). As much as I love the use of black and white, an ascent colour offers additional style and a new way of stylistic expression. The yellow I have chose, #ffcf59, represents the cheerful warmth and energised tone I want to set for it. I signifies positivity, growth and enlightenment.

Inspiration for the theme

Part of my family come from Manchester, England. They were born and raised there. I remember my childhood exploring this fascinating city with a deep passion for music, football and food. Their culture and pride is like nothing I have seen anywhere else.

The Manchester worker bee symbolises the Manchester poetically. It dates back to 1842 and represents the relentless work ethic of the people in Manchester during the Industrial Revolution. Even today, Manchester is a busy place, buzzing with people who work night and day. It is a hive of activity and unity.

My website’s colours are testament to my heritage and the place I call my second home. I taught in Manchester, went to university in Manchester and socialise there. My current place of work is five miles from the centre of Manchester and borders a Mancunian town.

Work in progress…

Like I mentioned in this post, content and features will slowly appear as I work on little aspects of it each day. Some parts of minimlr.com will be re-introduced. I am looking to improve on the site’s engagement features, spend time on quality content and create graphics that integrate with the style I want to portray.

Most of my posts from Medium.com will be posted on my website because I see the reach is limited on here if people do not subscribe.

Thank you for taking the time to read my post.

Mark @ CodeMacLife

Starting #100DaysOfCode again

Over a year ago, I thought I would have a go at coding and take part in the #100DaysOfCode challenge. I managed to get to day 40 before giving up because I have a holiday planned and other commitments at the time.

It’s not like it is going to be easier this time round. I have a week in August when I am away. However, I will be taking my iPad and keyboard with me where I can code using Textastic. I have more determination to face the challenge this time round.

What is the 100 Days of Code challenge?

According to their website, there are two main rules; 1) Code a minimum on one hour per day over one hundred day, and 2) tweet about it each day using the hashtag #100DaysOfCode. Simple.

The official site has lots of resources to help users along the way and encourages visitors to access them if they want to stand a chance of completing the challenge. In addition to Twitter, 100DaysOfCode.com offer a Discord and Slack server to post to. I personally will keep with Twitter for this challenge because I want to attempt the challenge again at a later date to see how each social platform responds to the updates.

What have I started to code with?

Before setting out on the challenge, I had web development in mind. I signed up to a course on Udemy and the content covers a broad reach of technologies to create website with multiple features.

I have installed Microsoft Visual Studio Code and installed the three extensions as requested for the course. Last time I attempted this course, Atom Editor was the application used for it. However, Microsoft sunsetted the app and now I am stuck with VS Code. Admiringly, I really like Code because it offers so many features that extend way past web development. I managed to create a Python programme in VS Code on my first day of the challenge.

Technically, HTML5 and CSS3 is not coding, but the course promises to develop the skills to be a full-stack developer by learning HTML, CSS, Javascript, Node, React, MongoDB, Web3 and DApps. The description lost me at JavaScript. Even then, I can only code a dropdown menu through the guidance of StackOverflow. I’m excited to see what I am able to achieve with this course.

So far I have started with the basics of using HTML to create lists, headings and links. To be honest, it’s the stuff I already know but I want to recap on it.

Aside from Web Dev, I have been working on a Python project and Scratch project for work (I work in a school and teach computing).

My Python project was to create a Magic 8 Ball, which gives responses when I ask it a question. The project was simple enough to follow and the final result was fun to use.

My second project involved using Scratch to create a monkey catapult game where you adjust the launch speed and sling the monkey over a tree to collect the bananas. The objective of the game is to collect all the bananas with the least amount of launches. This was a good test to see how gravity can be applied to a game using Scratch.

I know I am only on day two of the challenge. It is early days (literally two days) but I feel more confident with the challenge since completing my recent Understanding Coding Level 2 course over the past twenty weeks. It was a massive task to take on. The course tested me in so many ways and made me appreciate all the effort developers put in the software they create.

One last thing…

I posted about an app I use called Twos. I record all my notes from the coding I do in the Twos App. It is free with the option to pay for upgrades. However, by using my referral code, you can get additional coins to upgrade for free. Please take time to read my post on it and the follow-up I made.

As I have changed my online name from Minimlr to CodeMacLife, my Twos App referral code has changed.

Here is my new referral link — https://www.TwosApp.com?code=codemaclife

This is so true. I like to write for fun. It most resides in my journal. I’m not sure it is newsworthy content for Medium but I’m happy with that. I’m still playing catch up with your articles but what I have read is great.

Thanks for your post. I bought a MacBook Air last week and I’m learning something new each day.

Having a child is so tricky. It sounds nice but the emotional rollercoaster is taxing on the body and mind. Happy Father’s Day!

Sunsetting Minimlr + Life update

Hi. It’s Mark aka Minimlr. Just a quick life update and changes moving forward. I have decided to make some radical changes over the next few months. I’ve completed my coding course and passed. It has given me time to reflect on what I want to focus on in the future.

Software-wise, a lot has changed.

• I bought a MacBook Air M1
• I use Apple’s own calendar, reminders and notes
• I am still using Twos and Upnote.
• I appear to be spending a lot of time in Visual Studio Code at the moment.
• My Chromebook died (reason for buying the MacBook)
• I have decided to leave the whole Google ecosystem and close my Google Workspace account (long-term target)

Why am I sunsetting minimlr.com?

At the start, the whole minimlr blog was, for me, to start writing about minimalism and mindfulness. It sounded fun but I soon realised there were so many other things I wanted to write about. I thought I had boxed myself into a niche I don’t want to be writing about all the time. Also, I have changed as a person in the time I created the ‘brand’, as it were. Looking back, my posts were more about productivity, software and note-taking, digital minimalism, minimalism and life in general. It’s actually broad when I look back. By changing my scope and writing about what I care about, I will write more and do it frequently.

What is changing?

will be changing my username / bio to CodeMacLife. It’s a little cheesy I know, but hear me out. This change makes it clear about who I am, what I write about and what direction I want to move in.

Code. Mac. Life.

Code

- There will more emphasis and interaction with those in the tech/coding community. I will be posting about my coding and what I am currently working on. I think I might start the #100DaysofCode again.

Mac

This part is quite self-explanatory. I love my Mac, iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch. I will be posting about my use of them and how I use the native software as well as other software on these platforms, including how I use Twos across the Apple ecosystem. Spoiler: It’s awesome!

Life

This part is interesting because I get to write about everything I did with the minimlr handle. It will include minimalism, essentialism, digital detoxes, loving life away from the keyboard, mindfulness and much more.

One last thing…

It was probably the hardest thing to do but I have created a new Twitter account (I know, the shame!). Although I disagree with the handling and policies of Twitter, there are a lot of valuable resources for coding, web development and more importantly…the Twos community. ✌🏻

My Twitter handle is CodeMacLife.

The iOS 17 update will have board for Reminders. I like the Kanban style. You will also be able to add sections like Todoist.