The notch

Open the notch

The notch is on by default. Point at it and it drops open into a black panel; move the pointer away and it folds back a moment later. Clicking it never takes the keyboard from the app you are in, so dictation still types where you were. Only its note search, and the teleprompter once you click into it, take the keyboard.

It lives on the screen with a notch, so a display plugged into a laptop leaves it on the laptop. With no notched screen, it lives on the screen you are working on.

Screens without a notch

On a screen with no notch, it rests as a short handle under the middle of the top edge. Point near it and the notch drops open from there. Clicks around the handle pass through to the menu bar and the windows underneath.

What the open notch shows

From the top:

• Today’s date, left of the camera. While a recording runs, its clock sits on the right.
• The meeting card. The meeting under way, or else the next one to start in the coming 12 hours: a countdown such as “In 12 min”, “Now, 8 min left” or “At 14:30”, its title, its time and, when more than one person is invited, how many. Record starts recording it into a note named after it, which opens in MindLake behind the app you are in, so the call stays in front. Join opens its call link, when it has one. While a recording runs, the card shows that instead, with its clock and Stop. With no meetings left, it reads “No more meetings”. All-day events and bookings are left out.
• Six buttons in two rows of three, described below.
• The active note, the note your captures go into. See The active note, below.

The meeting card needs Settings ▸ Audio ▸ Show upcoming meetings. With it off, the card reads “No more meetings” with a Turn on button, which switches it on and asks for calendar access. See Recording meetings.

A button with a shortcut shows it beneath the notch while the pointer is on it. Capture and Grab text fold the notch away before you drag. See Screenshots.

When it is closed

Closed, the notch widens either side of the camera to show what is going on, the most pressing first:

Point at the notch while a recording or a meeting shows and it opens as usual. During a take it stays as it is.

Turn it on or off

Settings ▸ General ▸ Notch & menu bar has four switches:

The first three work in any combination, all three off included. A take shows at the notch, in the pill, or in both, whichever are on; with neither, the dictation key still works and nothing shows. With everything off, MindLake is still in the Dock (click it to open the library), in Spotlight, and on ⌥⌘K for the command bar and ⌥N for a new note, from any app.

The active note

Pick an active note and every screenshot, and every piece of text you grab off the screen, goes into it until you stop. Pick it either way:

• At the notch. Click the row under the buttons, which reads “No active note” until you pick one. A list opens: Search all notes, the note open in MindLake (marked Open now), your most recently edited notes, New note, which makes a note, opens it in MindLake and makes it the active note, and, while a note is active, Stop capturing into it.
• From the note. With a note open, choose Note ▸ Capture Into This Note. On the active note it reads Stop Capturing Into This Note.

Click Search all notes and type to find any note; ↩ picks the first match. Esc closes the search, and a click anywhere else gives the keyboard back to your app. Locked notes can’t be picked, and the choice is remembered for each vault.

While a note is active:

• Every screenshot attaches to it, however you take it and whatever Settings ▸ Screenshots ▸ Attach captures to the note you were last in says.
• Copy Text from Area and Grab text still copy the words, and also add them to the end of the note as a paragraph of their own; a table goes in as Markdown.
• Nothing else changes. Dictation types where your cursor is, a file dropped on the library window goes to the note on screen, and the capture card’s Copy text in image and Copy Text in Image in Sources only copy.

Teleprompter

The Prompter button plays a note beneath the notch, its words scrolling up as you read them aloud. It is on the notch only.

1. Click Prompter. A list opens with the caret already in its search field, above the note open in MindLake and your recent notes.
2. Type a note’s name and press ↩ for the first match, or click a note in the list. Locked notes can’t be played.
3. The script hangs beneath the notch, paused, with the note’s name left of the camera and the speed to its right. Click it, or press Space, to play.

Headings show as cues in square brackets, such as [Opening], dimmer and in italics, and so does a line you wrote in square brackets yourself. A meeting note’s transcript is left out, links read as their words and pictures are dropped. The script stops at its end; play it again to start from the top.

The keys work once you have clicked the script, and your app gets the keyboard back when you click in it. While the pointer is over the script, the same controls show as buttons: Start again, Slower, Play or Pause, Faster and Close.

Teleprompter settings

Settings ▸ General ▸ Teleprompter sets how the script looks and moves: