Changelog

Every change pushed to Sojourns gets documented here.

  1. Add Link to Changelog to Help & Community Menu

    v0.0.0-alpha.24 Feature Update

    Added a link to the Changelog page to the Help & Community menu so that you can get to the Changelog without going back to the public site first.

  2. Category Tags for Changelog Entries

    v0.0.0-alpha.23 Feature Update

    Updated all changelog entries to include a tag that helps categorize them at a glance. This also sets some groundwork for some searching and filtering functionality I would like to eventually add to the changelog page. There are four categories:

    • New Feature (Green): What it says on the tin
    • Feature Update (Blue): Any kind of expansion, modification, or other tweak to some existing feature
    • Bugfix (Orange): Squashing bugs
    • Maintenance (Gray): Under-the-hood stuff with little to no user-facing impact
  3. Expanded Slash Menu & Inline Hints

    v0.0.0-alpha.22 Feature Update

    • The Slash Menu (`/` while typing in the editor) now provides additional actions in addition to the existing Link and Image actions: Heading, Bulleted list, Numbered list, Quote, and Mention a page.
    • An empty page placeholder text has been updated to include hints on how to open the Slash Menu (`/`) and how to Mention a page (`@`).
  4. Keyboard Shortcuts Reference

    v0.0.0-alpha.21 New Feature

    Press ⌘ / on a Mac, or Ctrl + / on Windows / Linux / etc, to see a list of all of the hotkeys and Markdown shortcuts that you can use across Sojourns. You can also find them under Help & Community at the bottom of the Navigator panel.

    Notes

    One of my main goals for Sojourns is to facilitate a workflow that allows you to create, edit, and navigate your content as quickly, intuitively, and smoothly as possible. I hope that keyboard shortcuts can play a big role in that.

    A big inspiration for the Sojourns UI/UX is Obsidian. I think it sets a very strong precedent in what a smooth and efficient editing and content-navigation workflow looks like, and I hope to create a similar experience within Sojourns. All feedback is welcome, especially if you come across any points of your workflow within Sojourns that feels clunky, slow, or like the platform is getting in your way instead of helping your move and work quickly.

  5. Keyboard shortcuts for New Page and New Project

    v0.0.0-alpha.20 New Feature

    Press ⌥ ⌘ N on a Mac, or Ctrl + Alt + N on Windows / Linux / etc, to create a new Page from anywhere in the Studio. A keyboard shortcut to add a new Project has also been added: ⌥ ⌘ P, or Ctrl + Alt + P.

    Notes

    Defining keyboard shortcuts gets tricky for browser-based apps because of how many key combos are claimed by the browser. Ctrl + N sounds a lot cleaner than Ctrl + Alt + N, for example, but that is claimed by most browsers for opening a new browser instance. I will be interested in hearing back from users if the Sojourns key combos feel intuitive and easy to use, or if I should re-think what patterns the Sojourns shortcuts should follow.

  6. Add Community / Social Links

    v0.0.0-alpha.19 Feature Update

    Previously, there was no way to get to the Sojourns Bluesky or Discord from within the app. A Navigator menu item has been added that opens a menu with links to go to either of them.

  7. Navigator Panel Updates

    v0.0.0-alpha.18 Feature Update

    • Spotlight Search moved to top of Navigator panel (in desktop only)
    • All Projects (which allows you to get back to your Studio home) moved inside the Project Switcher
    • Redesigned the bottom left of the Navigator panel so Account / Theme / etc do not take up as much screen real estate
  8. Page/Project Names in Browser Tabs and History

    v0.0.0-alpha.17 New Feature

    Page and Project names are now displayed in your browser's tab name and history entries. Previously, they just showed a big ugly UUID and weren't very helpful in distinguishing one Page/Project from another.

  9. Mobile UI/UX Improvements, Batch 4

    v0.0.0-alpha.16 Feature Update

    Layout improvements for mobile. This is the last batch of changes in this series of mobile-focused UI/UX improvements.

    • The mobile browser bar and status bar should now automatically match the Sojourns light / dark themes
    • New Page, Edit, and Delete buttons moved into the top bar
    • New icons for opening the Navigation Drawer, Spotlight Search, and Inspector Drawer
    • Simplified layout for the Account management page
    • Bigger tap targets in most places
    • Some better focus management when closing stacked menus / drawers / etc.
  10. Mobile UI/UX Improvements, Batch 3

    v0.0.0-alpha.15 Feature Update

    Some menu, gesture and misc UX improvements for mobile. Part 3 in the series of changes to improve the mobile experience.

    • Page and project menus use bottom sheets instead of floating dropdowns
    • Tapping a link opens a new link-specific bottom sheet menu
    • Simpler Light / Dark / System theme switch
    • Swipe to close the side drawers
    • Notifications appear at the bottom, above the keyboard
    • No accidental search popups or tap flashes
  11. Mobile UI/UX Improvements, Batch 2

    v0.0.0-alpha.14 Feature Update

    Some writing improvements for mobile. Part 2 in the series of changes to improve the mobile experience and make it feel more like using a native app.

    • Formatting toolbar above the keyboard while writing
    • Undo/redo and hide keyboard buttons in the same toolbar
    • Mention and slash command menus use bottom sheet instead of floating dropdowns
  12. Mobile UI/UX Improvements, Batch 1

    v0.0.0-alpha.13 Feature Update

    Some general fixes & improvements for mobile. Part 1 of a series of upcoming changes to help the mobile experience feel more like using a native app.

    • Bigger tap surface for public site footer links
    • More intuitive/familiar patterns for closing overlays
    • More screen real estate while typing
    • Use bottom-sheets/drawers that rise up from bottom in place of modals
  13. Pinned Pages

    v0.0.0-alpha.12 New Feature

    This introduces the ability to pin Pages. Now, from the Inspector panel, you can pin any Page to the current Page so that it is always visible and easily accessible to the current Page you are on. Pinned Pages can also be unpinned at any time.

    Notes

    This is another feature aimed at my goal of keeping related content ultra accessible and easy/quick to navigate to. Some examples of how I think this could be handy:

    • You are writing and building out a town, and you know you are going to be jumping back and forth between four or five Pages, so you pin them together for this writing session.
    • You are running a game session and know that you will need to jump back and forth between a handful of Pages that otherwise aren't related, so you pin them together before the session and unpin them afterwards.
  14. Display Page Mentions in Inspector

    v0.0.0-alpha.11 New Feature

    This is basically the opposite of the "Backlinks" display. This change adds a list of other Pages that the current Page mentions to the Inspector panel.

    Just like the Backlinks list, each Page in this list can be clicked / tapped / activated to navigate to that Page.

  15. Display Page Backlinks in Inspector

    v0.0.0-alpha.10 New Feature

    This marks the first real content in the Page Inspector section. When you open the Inspector section on a Page, you will see a list of all other Pages that have a mention to the current Page.

    Notes

    The Pages in this list can be clicked / tapped / activated to go to that Page. My hope is that this is something that helps keep related data surfaced and easily accessible to help with fast, easy navigation to the content you need during worldbuilding / running a session / etc.

  16. Improve mobile UI/UX for Page create/edit screen

    v0.0.0-alpha.9 Feature Update

    This addresses some clunky UX that mobile users encountered in the Page Create / Edit flows. The small, centered floating modal that is used on desktop has been replaced with a mobile-specific bottom sheet. This also makes some changes to where auto focus lands, when the virtual keyboard is allowed to show, etc. The end result is more screen real estate for the create / edit forms, buttons, etc., plus a better experience when searching / filtering the Parent selector.

    Notes

    This is probably an area I'm going to need to continue to revisit and tweak. Any insights from what feels good, what is awkward or unintuitive, etc from real users on mobile is very welcome!

  17. Page modal flashing on narrow screens

    v0.0.0-alpha.8 Bugfix

    This addresses a bug where on some narrow devices, the page add / edit modal would rapidly flash when opening the Parent dropdown.

  18. Add breadcrumbs to Project Landing page list

    v0.0.0-alpha.7 Feature Update

    Breadcrumbs have been added to the list of Pages that are shown on a Project's landing page. A show/hide breadcrumbs toggle has also been added in case you'd like to hide these breadcrumbs (Example: on mobile, long breadcrumbs may wrap multiple times and take up a lot of vertical real estate that you might prefer to use for seeing as many Pages as possible)

    Notes

    More UX improvements to come in the next couple of weeks for this list of Pages on the Project landing page, including sorting (alphabetically, recency, etc), filtering, searching, and pagination.

  19. Under the hood stuff

    v0.0.0-alpha.6 Maintenance

    Rewrote the public marketing site to be more search-engine friendly. This will also help with Google OAuth brand verification, unblocking the way to enabling Google sign-in.

  20. Scroll to caret when entering mobile

    v0.0.0-alpha.5 Bugfix

    This fixes a small UI bug on mobile where the line in the editor where you put your tap could get covered up by the virtual keyboard. Now, the editor automatically scrolls to ensure that line remains visible when tapping into the editor.

  21. Spotlight Search

    v0.0.0-alpha.4 New Feature

    This adds a basic spotlight search which allows you to search all of your content by title and by breadcrumb. It can be entered by clicking / tapping / activating a search icon in various locations in the Studio UI, or it can be entered by pressing Mod + K from anywhere in the UI.

    Notes

    Future improvements to this will include fuzzy search, full text search, and context-based search (limit results to within any one project, limit results only to Pages that have a specific Tag, etc.)

  22. Reparenting with Drag & Drop or Context Menu

    v0.0.0-alpha.3 New Feature

    This release adds several ways to "reparent" a Page:

    1: In the Tree view, drag & drop a page from one parent to another. This will also maintain the hierarchy of the dragged node's descendants.

    2: Items in the tree now have a kebab button which can be clicked / tapped / activated to open a context menu. That context menu currently has just one item: "Move to". This can be clicked / tapped / activated to open a modal with a dropdown where a new parent can be selected.

    Notes

    This was an interesting one because of the mobile & a11y (accessibility) implications of a drag and drop feature. First time needing to do something like this. I did some research and found the WCAG success criteria that I think applies here: Success Criterion 2.5.7 Dragging Movements says "All functionality that uses a dragging movement for operation can be achieved by a single pointer without dragging, unless dragging is essential or the functionality is determined by the user agent and not modified by the author." (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG22/#dragging-movements)

    So based on that, we're good. But its a very "by the book" read on things. If you think we ought to have something more akin to true drag and drop for mobile & assistive technology users, feel free to let me know. It would be interesting to talk about and to learn more about your workflow.

  23. Image Upload and Display

    v0.0.0-alpha.2 New Feature

    This release adds image support to the Sojourns editor.

    Ways to upload an image:

    • Copy/paste
    • File drag & drop
    • New slash command: Type `/`, select "Image", pick one more images from your machine's file system to upload.

    Additional functionality includes:

    • Alt text
    • Click / tap / activate image to view it in a full-screen lightbox
    • View and edit the image's alt text in the full-screen lightbox

    Notes

    Much more image functionality to come. Not too far on the horizon is:

    • Image resizing
    • Asset gallery for image storing and selecting
    • Image alignment
    • Image carousel

    Further down the line also open to considering inline images with configurable text wrapping, etc. If you think this is something that would be useful to your own workflow please let me know, interested in hearing what people think on this one.

  24. First Sojourns Deployment!

    v0.0.0-alpha.1 New Feature

    Sojourns is live and the adventure begins! Woohoo!

    This is the first deployment of the Sojourns pre-release / alpha version, with a limited core feature set of a basic editor and basic content management functionality.