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Quick links: |  | View/Edit Pane Navigation Bar Editing Bar Tag Bar Context Menu Items Toolbar & Shortcuts

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When working with files in DEVONthink, they can be viewed in the view/edit pane of a main window or in a separate document window. When viewing a document, there are two essential components visible: the view/edit area and the navigation bar. These will always be available when working with a selected file. Additionally, there are a few optional components available: the editing bar (for compatible formats), the tag bar, and the context menu. View/Edit Pane The view/edit pane is where you can see or edit the current document (with compatible files). Each file type you view has its own tools, context menu commands, and keyboard shortcuts. Navigation Bar At the top of the view/edit pane, DEVONthink shows a navigation bar that gives you access to some additional tools that deal directly with the contents of the document. Which tools are available depends on the type of the document you are viewing. The options below are shown in the navigation bar for most file types. Specific options are shown in the separate sections: Navigates back to the last visited document after following a link. Navigates back to the next visited document after going back. Reloads the displayed page in a web view. Only visible for, e.g., bookmarks. Shows an action menu with options for opening the shown page in Safari, copy its address, or capture the page in a variety of formats. Shows if the document is locked or editable. Scrolls to the previous highlight, e.g., a search term occurrence. Scrolls to the next highlight, e.g., a search term occurrence. Scrolls to the next page of the displayed document. Scrolls to the previous page of the displayed document. Switches to Text Alternative mode. Useful for selecting text in uneditable formats, e.g., Word documents. Switches to Best Alternative mode. For Markdown documents, this is the rendered HTML view. Word Count: Shows the number of paragraphs, words, and characters of the displayed text. URL: Shows the URL associated with the displayed item, if one is present. If a PDF annotation is selected the URL field shows the associated URL if available. Click to launch the URL in its default application. Hold the ⌥ Option or the ⌘ Command key to open the URL in a new tab. Holding ⇧⌥ or ⇧⌘ opens the URL in a new tab and selects it. Page Count: Shows the number of pages as well as the page number of the currently displayed page. Click the page number in PDF or PostScript documents and enter a page number to jump directly to that page. Editing Bar For some formats, e.g., rich text or sheets, there is another bar available: the Editing bar. If you click this icon , the editing bar will appear in place of the Navigation bar. This offers quick access to some editing tools related to the file type you're working on. See the appropriate file type section for more info. Tag Bar The tag bar, which can be shown or hidden, shows all tags associated with the document. Click the tag bar and type to add tags; select a tag and press the ⌫ Backspace or ⌦ Delete key to remove it. Read more... When you type the name of a tag, DEVONthink offers automatic completion. Choose the right option with the mouse or the arrow keys and press ↩ Return or ⌤ Enter to accept it. Press ⎋ Escape to use whatever you entered. Auto-completion prefers ordinary tags (tags represented in the Tags group) over groups used as tags, and also matches sub-strings. Press ⇥ Tab to enter another tag.
Note: The tag bar is also visible for multiple selected documents when all the documents have the same tags attached. Use it to change the tags on multiple documents.
Context Menu Items If you Control-click in many types of documents in DEVONthink, you are presented with a context menu showing many options. The options displayed depend on what you're clicking; e.g., selected text, and in whether you're in an editing or preview mode. As many of these commands are the same for most formats, we have provided a list in the appendix. Items specific to a format are listed in their respective sections in this chapter. Toolbar & Shortcuts DEVONthink can display documents in separate windows when you double-click the documents in a main window. Depending on the type of document, the tools in the toolbar can change. Even though not all tools are always present in the default toolbar for a particular type, you can easily add some by choosing View > Customize Toolbar. Changes made to the toolbar will be persistent for that file type, but are independent of the toolbars of other types. Please find a list of toolbar items and shortcuts in the appendix.
Note: Documents are automatically saved every five minutes after the last modification, when deactivating the window, or when quitting DEVONthink.