Notepad Tour

The quiet surface. Every studio needs a place where thinking happens before it has a shape — meeting notes, half-formed plans, a sketch in the margin next to a typed list. The notepad is that place in Circuitry: typed notes and handwritten pages living together on one sheet of paper, with the full pen tray one keypress away. No canvas to arrange, no nodes to wire — just paper that keeps up with you, inside the same studio as your whiteboards, workflows, and code.

The whole editor pivots on a single key: press ⇥ to flip between typing and drawing. Type an agenda, ⇥, circle the item that matters and sketch the idea it triggered, ⇥, keep typing. The paper itself is one continuous sheet — it simply grows as your note does, so there are no page breaks to manage.

(Shortcuts below show Cmd — use Ctrl on Windows/Linux.)

A tour of the controls

The notepad keeps its chrome out of the way until you ask for it.

The corner icons (top-right)

Two small icons fade in when you move the pointer over the note (or touch it):

• Pencil mode — flips between pencil (ink) mode and text mode; glows blue while you're inking. ⇥ does the same thing.
• Settings — slides the header toolbar down over the top of the note. Tap or click anywhere on the paper to dismiss it again.

The header toolbar (slide-down)

Open it with the icon. From left to right:

• Note title — double-click the name to rename it inline; ⏎ saves, Esc cancels.
• Paper colour — opens a grid of paper-colour swatches, plus a rainbow Custom colour swatch that opens a full colour picker.
• Paper style — one button cycles the paper background through its four styles, and its icon shows the current one: lined, grid, squared, blank.
• Undo / Redo — step your ink history back and forward (shown while in pencil mode). ⌘Z / ⌘⇧Z.
• Pencil / Text — a two-segment mode switch; the active mode is filled blue. Same flip as ⇥.
• Save — saves the note (⌘S); the button tints amber while there are unsaved changes.

The pen tray (pencil mode)

Enter pencil mode and a tray of drawing implements docks at the bottom edge — the same pens you'll find on the whiteboard, so nothing you learn here is notepad-only. The tray stays tucked with just the nibs peeking up; hover over it (or swipe up on touch) and it rises, with each implement's name fading in. Every implement remembers its own ink colour, so switching pens brings its colour back with it.

• Pen — freehand fountain pen whose line width responds to speed and pressure.
• Pencil — a graphite-grey pencil preset for softer, sketchier lines.
• Ballpoint — constant-width ballpoint in classic ink blue.
• Marker — constant-width felt tip for bolder strokes.
• Highlighter — wide translucent strokes; overlapping passes build up like a real highlighter.
• Shape — freehand strokes snap to recognised shapes. Tap it again while active to choose a mode: Auto, Rect, Oval, Circle, or Poly.
• Write — the handwriting pen. Tap it again to pick a mode: Auto OCR converts your handwriting into editable text as you pause, while Type places a text cursor where you click. Your choice is remembered in Settings.
• Eraser — removes whole strokes with a touch (no brush size to fiddle with).
• Arrow — drag a straight line with an arrowhead. Tap again to choose the end cap: none, arrow, triangle, stealth, circle, square, diamond, or bar.
• Select — select ink to move or edit. Tap again to switch between Lasso, Rect, and Brush selection.

The small button at the tray's top-left corner exits pencil mode and drops you back into text mode.

The property capsule (pencil mode)

While you're inking, a slim capsule floats at the top of the note with the properties of the current implement (it steps aside while the header toolbar is open):

• Colour swatch — a round swatch in your current ink colour; click it for a palette of twelve curated colours plus a Custom picker.
• Size slider — stroke thickness, with a live nib preview that grows and shrinks as you drag.
• Opacity slider — for the marker and highlighter, from a whisper to full strength.
• Font picker — with the Write pen active, choose the font your handwriting is recognised into (or that typed text uses): recent fonts, a curated preset list with live previews, and a More fonts… row that opens the full catalog.
• – / + size stepper — in Type mode, steps the text size up and down.
• Undo / Redo — the same ink history, kept in reach while you draw.
• Select / Pan — switch between working on the page and moving it around.
• Snap — appears while you're editing a stroke's vertices or drawing a fixed shape; toggles vertex snapping, green when on.

Keyboard

Works with the rest of the studio

The notepad is one surface of one studio — the same ink, pens, and paper habits carry everywhere:

• The Smart Whiteboard — when a note outgrows paper and wants to become a diagram, a design, or a running workflow.
• Apple Pencil & High-Resolution Ink — how Circuitry captures pressure and detail from a stylus.
• iPad Gestures — the touch and pencil gestures that make the notepad feel like paper on a tablet.