One of the use-cases featured by the developer, Luc Beaudoin (creator of MySleepButton) involves another favorite app HoudahSpot, which MacSparky also discussed recently, in combination with OmniFocus. Part of my daily and weekly reviews involved looking over documents and PDFs Iāve worked on during the past 48 hours (daily) or the past 2 weeks (weekly). Once Iāve saved the search criteria for a HoudahSpot search (see the screenshot of ā48hours.hssearchā), I can use the Hook app to make a link to that saved search and paste that into the note field of the relevant repeating OmniFocus task (here, Iāve been inspired by Kourosh Diniās approach to the āconsidered taskā). Then, with a keyboard shortcut from Keyboard Maestro, I can run Jesse David Hollingtonās script to open the link, and ā boom! ā Iām in the list of files displaying with a particularly beautiful and function preview window in HoudahSpot.
Thanks to Terpstraās suggestion, Iāve been using the Hook beta for a while. It is a very clever application that I believe ingeniously fills a gap for researchers or anyone who works with multiple related files / webpages / Bear notes, etc. It takes a little time to get used to Hook, then the penny drops with an āaha ā of course this makes senseā moment. I recommend spending time on the Hook site with the videos, blog, and help pages ā this is a beta effort at this time, so the app is at the early stages of evolution as are the help pages. The owner, Luc Beaudoin, is very engaged with users and is open to comments, suggestions, and guidance on user priorities.
This is a fine example of the āartisanal softwareā that Mark Bernstein writes about: a developer with a well-informed point of view who sees their work as a craft, and produces something different worth listening to.
Hook looks incredible, thanks for posting!
Copying a markdown link to a website is so easy!
When creating presentations or posters, or even notes, the whole process seems āfragileā and I wonder if the resources may become misplaced, etc.
Now I learn that Notebooks (the note taking app I had finally settled on), doesnāt support Apple Script. Arg! I can still paste in markdown links, but really wanted the two-way connection.
A couple of things to consider @JohnAtl, the āLink to Newā action in Hook creates a new document based on one of the built-in templates or a custom one. A ātemplateā can be a blank document, or one youāve formatted. Only one template per editor app is allowed at this time. The āLink to Newā action puts the newly-created document in ~/Documents/Hook/notes (you can configure a different default folder).
The dev says you can move the files from there to elsewhere ā something I havenāt tested much. Iāve found you cannot move the files into DEVONthink though, so Hook seems to lose track of files inside packages. I donāt like that, but I guess the work around is to define a default destination folder and index that folder in DEVONthink.
When you create a note file linked, say, to a web page, Hook knows about the relationship, so if you invoke Hook while editing the linked note file then you can see the āparentā and click back to the web page or wherever you started. He says there will be visualization and/or improved navigation in future betas.
Betas are free ā so no worries about going along for the ride for now.
Thanks @anon41602260 . Thatās right, (speaking as the designer) Hook links are robust under Finder moves. Moving something into Evernote or DEVONthink would not normally be a move in that sense. (Similarly in macOS strictly speaking one canāt āmoveā a file across volumes. macOS does a copy operation in that case.) However, this is something I think we will be able to address because we do track a bit of info about the file. For example, you can unmount a Dropbox share or a RCS (e.g., Git) repository and remount it elsewhere, and normally Hook links should still work (so theyāre more robust than aliases.)
Thereās also āLink to Newā > EverNote. And we will add āLink to Newā > in DEVONthink too.
How does Hook work across multiple macs, for those of us with a multi Mac lifestyle?
Edit: Found answer. You can both export and import for backup/restore, and put the ānotesā folder anywhere on the disk, including on Dropbox, iCloud, NAS and so on.
BibDesk allows linking to files in what is, I believe (without too much under the hood knowledge) a similar manner, and it works fine on multiple Macs as long as the file locations are in sync.
But likewise, what plans are in place for an iOS version? Obviously it couldnāt work with arbitrary file locations but most of the major cloud providers allow linking to files, so there should be ways around many of the iOS limitations.
Joel, this is the coolest thing since sliced bread. It reminds me a bit of the app Crusoe which is specifically for use with Evernote on the iPad. I can use Hook, however, on the laptop and it bridges between everything, not just notes. Iām definitely going to be playing with this. Iāve already got a few ideas.
Your HoudahSpot search with a repeating task is a really handy use of the tool. Iām trying it out now.
If the links are as robust as they seem so far, Hook lets us link much more handily with files in the Finder than before, particularly with Hollingtonās script as you point out.
Hook cannot yet automatically sync data between different Macs. That is something we at CogSci Apps intend to support.
Meanwhile, if one is so inclined they can manually transfer data from Hookās Library folder (~/Library/Application\ Support/com.cogsciapps.hook) between Macs, following the instructions listed there.
Hook is laser-focused on enabling users to robustly identify and access arbitrary information resources. It enables creating and linking files in third-party apps (e.g., files, Apple Notes) rather than in its own format. So if you want links to/from those files and items to work, youāll want to sync them too, of course.
correct. Hook creates a ~/Documents/Hook folder containing notes which can be synced or transferred with whatever tools one already uses for that. Notes (ieā¦, documents or items) created via Hook can be stored anywhere (on disk, or in database apps like Evernote and OmniFocus).
Hook also allows you to (automatically or manually) create .hook files, which are one-line files that combine and extend the functionality provided by aliases and .webloc. (They are written in plain text (Markdown) and can contain a link with whatever scheme you want.) By default they are created in the ~/Documents/Hook folder. However, they too can be stored anywhere, and can be copied across Macs any which way one chooses, whether or not one transfers the Hook Library between Macs.
(Disclosure: Iām a co-founder of the company that develops Hook.)
Hey @JohnAtl, we were able to add support for Notebooks 2 to Hook.
Notebooks 2 uses slightly brittle links which break if you move a note to a different book, or rename it, which is unfortunate. Iāve messaged the developers about using some kind of persistent UUID to link their notes, so hopefully it will get better in the future.
Also, weāve integrated Notebooks 2, which is still in public beta. We havenāt yet added integration with the original version of Notebooks.
