got it
Hey Matt!
I ran across a few issues in PaperTrail - first, when trying to move tasks up/down (i opened papertrail guide file as an example and expanded all to the lowest level so everything is visible) the cursor jumps like crazy. It’s not an end of view issue, it happens even when im trying to move anything in the middle of my view. Here are 2 vids showing the crazy jumps, I’m visually getting lost of whatever it is I’m moving and where:
Second - i can’t move a whole branch between Projects (with ctrl+alt+cmd+up/down, Move to cmd+\ works). Simply nothing happens when you get the branch to the bottom of current project and where the next one begins. Move ctrl+cmd+up/down works, but if the branch is folded it gets messy, it unfolds the branch and moves ONLY the parent (which for me is really undesirable as if the branch is folded, I’d expect the whole thing to move, not just the parent item). CMD+z gets messed up too and only undoes 1 action, won’t go further after this.
Three - when i move a folded branch with ctrl+alt+cmd+up/down the focus gets lots after the first action, so i can’t move it more than 1 line without recalling the cursor with arrow keys. I also can’t move 2 or more folded branches with this command, it only moves the first line out of however many i selected. If i use ctrl+cmd+up/down it messes up the branches with only moving the parent items and breaks undo.
The app is lovely, but these edge cases (if you can call em that) are making the experience less than stellar for me. Hopefully this was constructive enough for you to look into if you investigate and feel the same.
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Thanks for the detailed report. It’s exactly what I need to get to the bottom of things.
@Hickz what OS are you running on your iPad?
I’ll get these reproduced and fixed ASAP.
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Whatever the latest patch of iPadOS 26 is what I’m running.
I really need to get myself a new iPad, but thankfully it wasn’t needed for these fixes.
Once again, thanks so much for the detailed report. All three were real bugs, and your write-up made them straightforward to track down.
Everything below is fixed and will be in the next release:
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- Cursor jumping during move up/down: fixed with changes to how lines are moved and how document is rebuilt.
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- Moving branches between projects: This was an old decision by me that pre-dated the “let’s try to do everything the same as TaskPaper”, what can I say but it seemed to make sense at the time
Anyway, good catch! Move Branches Up/Down (⌃⌥⌘↑/↓) now crosses project boundaries. Move Up/Down (⌃⌘↑/↓) on a folded item now moves the whole folded branch as one unit instead of splitting the parent off from its children. - And the undo bug was deeper than it looked: any structural command (so a bunch, but not all) was silently wiping the undo history after one ⌘Z. That’s been totally redone; undo now steps back through every move, interleaved correctly with typing.
- Moving branches between projects: This was an old decision by me that pre-dated the “let’s try to do everything the same as TaskPaper”, what can I say but it seemed to make sense at the time
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- Folded branches and multi-select: the cursor now rides with the folded branch, so you can press the shortcut repeatedly without re-placing it. Selecting two or more branches and moving them now moves all of them together, and the selection stays on the moved block so you can keep going.
Your report also led me and automated testing to find and fix a batch of related edge-case bugs for folded content. So thanks again, this made the app better well beyond the three things you hit.
What I find so interesting about this app, and TaskPaper as a format, is that people use it in so many different ways. Now that I’ve seen a bunch, I would say that I am a very light/casual user. So feedback from more heavy/serious users is essential for good app health.
Perhaps the app will never truly be bug/quirk/edge-case free, like most software, so it’s important that people keep sending in their findings so I can increase testing code coverage and getting it behaving as well as I can. I think we’re doing OK for an app that is not yet 1 year old (my first local version was 19th Aug 2025), compared to TaskPaper’s 19 years.
Also, PaperTrail is currently ON SALE for a limited time.
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Glad to hear it was helpful!
the beauty of plain text is it’s adaptability and freedom from lock-in.
I don’t think Jesse intended Taskpaper to be used as I use it now: I have a project list at the top of my file, and a daily log running at the bottom (keeping track of what I’ve done as a journal of sorts). This is why I wanted to move branches between projects (which are weekdays in my case).
I’ve tried many apps before (Godspeed came closest but iOS/ipad apps are atrocious, unfortunately; Things, which is great but Apple only; others which I don’t want to list cos I’m ashamed to admit to even myself how much time I’ve wasted on this fruitless quest of finding THE app). I’ve ran Taskpaper/PaperTrail as my main system for 2 months now and it’s the KISS (keep it simple, stupid) solution I’ve been looking for all along. The only thing I kinda miss is native reminders, but there’s reminders export here. (One thing I intend to do is try all of this with Bike, as I absolutely love how it feels on Mac, but would miss iOS/ipad apps for now, and it’s not entirely plain text but has its own advantages in the form of attachments, links, attributes and rich text)
I digress. PaperTrail is tremendous value at full price, nevermind the sale
With each release it’s getting closer to what Taskpaper already is on Mac for me. Thank you for this gem
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Thank you!
I also just launched a pixel art editor, Dottie, that I’ve been working on alongside PaperTrail.
My life in apps is at: https://www.gingerbeardman.com/apps/
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1.4.2 is released!
Possibly the fastest review I’ve ever had.
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Hi. Lovely app, and the fiver off in the sale made it a little more palatable to purchase.
Forgive me if this has been covered elsewhere, but I’m finding Searches a little confusing. On TaskPaper on the desktop, I can create a Search and have it appear in the sidebar, embedded in the document. Can PaperTrail not pick these up? I end up having to re-add to PaperTrail, then have a Searches: project – which I don’t want – with the search then appearing twice on TaskPaper.
I appreciate that I might be making a mess of this, but I’m trying to determine the best practice for managing searches between the two apps.
TL;DR – Is it possible just to have embedded searches shared between PaperTrail and TaskPaper and not create a Searches: project?
Glad that the sale price works for you!
For reference:
- PaperTrail:
normal $20on sale $15 - TaskPaper: normal $30
Regarding searches, they should be interoperable with TaskPaper. I don’t use them myself so it sounds like I’m missing an element of their implementation? I’ve been unable to reproduce it.
If you could provide two small examples: one showing a TaskPaper search that isn’t picked up by PaperTrail and a second showing how you are having to double up. Thank you. Then I’ll have what I need to get this licked!
Edit: Aha! it had passed me by that TaskPaper supports app-wide searches, available from every doc (currently unsupported by PaperTrail) and document-embedded searches only available in the doc (this is what PaperTrail currently supports). So I’ll have to have a think about how I can do this—thanks for spotting this missing feature!
Hi Matt. Thanks for the response. I had missed your edit before knocking up this PDF, but you seem to be further down the track on understanding what I was on about, anyway.
And, just to be clear, I’m no TaskPaper power user. I do however like the speed of set up on my Mac if I need to work through things on a short project very quickly. I was using 1Writer on my iPhone 13 Mini to open up my TaskPaper files on the rare occasions I needed to view them away from my Mac. It was a bit of a chore to do so, and hence PaperTrail felt like a bit of a decadent purchase just to aid viewing files. That’s why the sale made it feel slightly less indulgent.
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This will be in 1.4.3, it was an easy add on top of the current architecture—hurrah!
So thanks again for the request. I might start using searches myself 
That’s great. Many thanks.
In terms of the UI, have you ever thought of having long-press on a task’s text, invokes the horizontal blue bar making it moveable within the outline? I appreciate you can move by tapping to the left of the starting task dash, but I invariably end up tapping on the dash and completing the task. It’s just too fiddly. I’m also aware this can also be done by using the icons in the tool belt, but as the keyboard and tool belt cover half my phone’s screen, it’s not really ideal when I’d prefer just to see the as much of file’s contents on the entire screen, and re-jig positions in the easiest manner possible.
I think you are saying that you know it’s already possible to move tasks by dragging the fold circle marker, or the place where the fold marker would be (same as TaskPaper macOS). In fact the hit area is much larger than the circle (as tall as the line and square in shape) so it increases as text size increases. You might also experiment with holding to the left of the fold circle, let me know how you get on.
But I’ll have a think if it’s possible for me to detect gesture long press on text. My gut/hunch is that the system already uses that gesture for cursor movement.
When possible I try to do things the same way as TaskPaper, unless there are “mobile” rules that outweigh it.
1.4.3 is live—“global” search works well! Thanks @G_Scone
If people could please leave a review for the latest version it always helps.
Well, I’m not sure if it’s me and my lumpy fingers and/or my Mini’s small screen, but I get, at best, mixed results when trying to replicate TaskPaper’s click and move in PaperTrail using the UI, not the tool bar. Also, if I do manage to get that blue horizontal line to appear, I’ve then not got any indication that I have indeed selected the correct text, unlike what you would get in TaskPaper when the text drags with it.
Hence the suggestion for the long-press on text/row, which gives a bigger target and clear indication of what’s selected when attempting to move. Would think there’d be a way to achieve in SwiftUI or UIKit by now.
Will give it some time when I can; would be cool!
So how does this work? I’m on 1.4.3 but don’t see my TaskPaper global (app level) searches appear in PaperTrail.
No, you won’t. PaperTrail iOS and TaskPaper macOS don’t communicate, share or sync settings in any way. They are made by different developers and are on different platforms.
- TaskPaper global searches are specific to that app on macOS
- PaperTrail global searches are specific to that app on iOS
- Per-document
Searches:section is how searches become portable or transferable
But, you might be able to temporarily store global searches in a file to bring them over, you could call it SearchTransfer.taskpaper and keep it around for that purpose if your churn of global searches is high/frequent.
Or just recreate them by hand as a one-off.
Hopefully that makes sense? @G_Scone
Great stuff. Now understand the implementation. Got them working. Cheers.
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perhaps I miss it…
Is there a way to quick Insert Date?
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