It feels like the band is getting back together, with all the tooling I used to use coming back into my life. Earlier this this month I started using OmniFocus again on account of it working the same way my brain did. In a similar vain, I was surprised and happy to see Zachary’s Notational Velocity, and Brett Terpstra’s nvALT fork both get updates, which let them run on modern macOS. Notational Velocity was another tool I first learned about from Back to Work in the early 2010s. It’s deceptively simple: you point it to a folder of plain text files, and it presents them in a scrollable list you can quickly search and live edit without leaving the keyboard. You can also link between text files with MediaWiki-style inline links. I liken the experience of using Notational Velocity to an electronic zettlekasten, with files taking the place of cards. I’m running the latest now Notational Velocity now, which at the time of writing is release 2.5.2. I imported all my old text files, and I’m right back to where I was all those years ago: This gets us to the new version of nvALT, which Brett updated to 3.0.5. nvALT was a fork of Notational Velocity that added several quality of life features, including a live markdown preview (Brett later directed his efforts into the new nvUltra, which is entirely new). I started on nvALT, before moving upstream to Notational Velocity where I sat for many years. Both are excellent. Just as with OmniFocus, I tried replicating the same experience of editing notes with both Notational Velocity and nvALT in other tools, but none took. I didn’t like org-mode (sorry), but NERDTree on Vim with a couple of custom keybindings got close. Still, I don’t think you can beat the workflow and ease of use of the originals. I also tried using outliners, but I love the flexibility of free-form notes. If you’re on the Mac, and had a fondness for #productivity tools from the 2010s in particular, I can’t recommend Notational Velocity highly enough. It’s wonderful to have it back. (I’ve also updated the Notational Velocity Wikipedia article to reflect these new versions). By Ruben Schade in Sydney, 2026-10-26.

I always liked stories about eccentric royals doing mad things. Queen Christina of Sweden reportedly had a miniature cannon made for firing tiny cannonballs at fleas in her bedroom. Louis XIV made a proto-reality-show of his daily routines, allowing an audience of courtiers the honor of watching him dress, bathe, and use the toilet. Peter the Great famously returned from […]

The (Re)insurance AI Landscape

to become the version of yourself needed in the next chapter

Fun and other necessities, revisited