After using it for just a few weeks, I have already come up with several dozen expansions that I now regularly use. With just a few lines you can define a wide range of custom expansions. What I really love about this interface is it’s simplicity. Now anytime I type :test, the text will expand to Hello World!. # Simple text replacement - trigger : ":test" replace : "Hello World!" You can find it’s location with this in the terminal: To set a text expansion, all you have to do is edit the default.yml file. It’s really simple to get it up and running – check it out. because it’s all there in the espanso documentation. Note: I’m skipping a lot of details about installation, etc. In fact, I have become such a fan of espanso that I decided to sit down and write a whole post highlighting some of the ways I use it. So far, it has integrated quite nicely into my day-to-day workflow. More than anything, I started (and kept) using espanso because I found it to be remarkably simple to use and easy to customize. Of course if you’d like to support the project you can donate here. But I prefer to use open source software whenever possible (the espanso source code is on GitHub), and especially when using software that tracks the text you type (imagine how easy it would be to grab passwords with this type of software). There are lots of these programs out there, such as Typinator, or the creatively-named “ textexpander” (macOS even has a build-in expander). Text expander programs “expand” short text “triggers” into longer / more complex strings of text, like this: With on-the-fly corrections to words you may misspell often, reduce the time spent editing and never spell that word wrong again (well, on a Mac, at least).I recently discovered a wonderfully useful little program called espanso – a “text expander” that I now use on a daily basis. Because you can define snippets of any length you can take a sentence or two that would cause you to type 25 characters and reduce it to 2 characters. Typinator is a solid productivity booster. This allows you to re-use expansions or customize them slightly on a per-application basis (i.e., using +mysig in a word processor may expand to an image of your signature whereas in email or a plain-text editor it may expand to a text representation of your name). So if HTML snippets should only be expanded in TextMate or any other text or HTML editor, it can be defined so that <<tt does not expand in Xcode or the Terminal. The same can be done with Typinator as well by just adding it to your personal snippets.įinally, Typinator supports enabling different snippets on a per-application basis. The nice thing about the built-in OS X expansions is that they support special characters for instance typing (c) would expand to the unicode © character. You can even have it insert pictures as an expansion, such as writing in a document and typing +mysig and having it expand by inserting an image of your signature. You can use it for UNIX commands on the command line you can use it to insert the current date and time you can insert plain text or rich text. Below is an example of snippet abbreviations and their expansions in Typinator. For instance, typing, with the cursor positioned between the two HTML tags. It also comes with HTML snippets, which are expansions that are meant for writing HTML code. This includes auto-correction sets that will fix typos and common spelling mistakes (such as spelling “wierd” instead of “weird”). Unlike the small number of expansions that OS X comes with, Typinator has support for a number of expansion sets from when you first install it. The only thing you have to do is type, and it will perform the expansion for you. Instead, an automatic text tool like Typinator will do this for you, as you type, in nearly every application. As well, this will only work in Cocoa apps and, even then, not in every application. With Mac’s built-in Symbol and Text Substitution (see the Text tab in the Language & Text Preference Pane), it isn’t automatic you have to select Edit from the menu bar and then Substitutions, and then you can perform the substitutions from there. With Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard), you can get this feature for free, but there are other alternatives that are much more flexible and powerful. If you type the same thing over again, or are prone to making the same spelling or text mistakes over and over, a text expansion and correction utility may be exactly what you need. Typinator allows you to save time typing and will also correct oft-misspelled words. Vincent Danen introduces his favorite tool for automating text in Mac OS X. Save time and avoid errors with Typinator for the Mac
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |