Here's a quick primer about getting started using Life Journal. The main screen is displayed below and its core functionalities are outlined:
In the screen above, the functionalities are as follows:
A: Opens the main application menu bar.
B: Create a new journal entry
C: Delete the selected journal entry (you will be prompted to verify that you want to delete the entry).
D: Opens the Images viewer which will allow you to see all of the images across all of your entries. You can click each entry to see its EXIF data (if available).
E: Data Import option. Opens a sub menu (see below) that let's you pick data import from Day One v2 (using JSON exported file) or from DO Journal (automatically detects DO Journal location from the DO Journal preferences file).
To import data from Day One v2, or to sync Life Journal with Day One Classic, please review the detailed How-To guide.
To import data from DO Journal, please follow these steps:
- IMPORTANT: In DO Journal, ensure that your data is not encrypted. (Go into Settings and uncheck the Encrypt Data checkbox.)
- Close DO Journal.
- Start Life Journal.
- Open the DO Journal Data Import Screen. The app will automatically look for your DO Journal installation and find the location of your DO Journal data.
- Run the import.
- Restart Life Journal after import is completed.
F: Opens the About screen. Here you can see the installed version of the application as well as various means by which you can contact us.
G: Opens the Settings Screen. You can configure Life Journal to your liking and set up things like Sync (with Day One Classic and/or Dropbox), Writing Reminders
Set a Password
Change application appearance with Themes/Styles and set the font for the entry text
and set Location defaults (in case your PC does not have a location sensor).
H: Closes the application
I: Shows all entries (if a filter or search has been applied)
J: Click on the star to see all Starred entries (fires a search)
K: Click on the image to see all entries with images (fires a search)
L: Click on the calendar to see all entries on this day and month (fires a search)
M: Attach a photo to the entry. If a photo is already assigned, the existing photo is replaced by the new one you pick.
N: Opens the tags manager. Search for tags. If the tag you searched for is unavailable, you can add it by clicking the (+) button. Search finds items as you type and highlights them in the left column. When you find the tag you want, just click on the (>) button to assign it to the entry. You can remove assigned tags by selecting the item in the right column and clicking the (<) button.
O: Toggle if an entry is Starred or not. Click the button to Star it (filled Yellow color) and click it again to unstar it (unfilled star outline).
P: Displays the more actions menu. Click the envelope to email either the selected text of your entry or all of your entry. Click the bird to tweet either the selected text of your entry or all of your entry. Click the text file icon to export your entry to a text file and open it in your editor. Click on the HTML export icon to export your entry to HTML and open it in your browser.
Q: If a location sensor is available, a location is automatically tagged to your entry. If a location sensor is not available, you will be able to set a default location in the Settings screen. You can also edit the location by going into the location screen and setting a location manually. Click on the location marker or the location text to open the location viewer which will show you where you were when this entry was created.
R: If an entry has a location assigned, Life Journal will automatically get the weather for the date/time and location (Powered By DarkSky.Net) and attach it to your entry. You can click on the weather icon or the temperature to view more details:
S: Clicking the calendar on the image will use the date/time of the image (if available in the EXIF data)
T: Clicking the location marker on the image will use the location where the image was taken (if GPS data is available in the EXIF data)
U: Clicking the delete button on the image will remove the image from the entry.
V: Clicking on the image itself (either here or in the Images Viewer) will open the single image viewer which will also display the EXIF data of the image (if available)
W: Clicking on the Prompts and Templates button will open a menu that will allow you to insert a Writing Template or a Writing Prompt:
Clicking on the first icon in the drop down will open the Templates manager. From here you can select a template to be inserted into your entry. The app comes with several templates - simply select one and click the checkmark button to insert it into your entry. You can also edit an existing template, create a new template or delete a template.
Clicking on the second icon in the drop down will insert a random Writing Prompt into your entry. If you don't like the inserted prompt, just click the button again, and the writing prompt will be replaced by another prompt. Over 600 prompts are included with the application, and more will be added over time.
X: Click on this button to edit the date and time of the entry.
Y: Click this button to enter distraction-free writing mode. The editor expands to cover most of the real estate of the application. Click on it again to collapse distraction-free writing mode.
Z: This is your entry editor. Type your journal entry in here.
2: (I skipped 1 to prevent confusion with I). This is your search bar. It is very powerful and allows you to do a full search of your entries. Start typing text to find results. You can also search for the weather conditions (try typing Sunny), entries on a date (try 20 Mar 2017 to see entries on a specific day OR 16 Dec to see all entries on that day/month), etc.
3: These are all your entries. Click on any one of them to see its details and edit them.