We\u2019re excited to share this reimagined look at Journal, and we\u2019re excited to hear your feedback<\/a>. You can watch the project overview on YouTube<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Microsoft has been pioneering ink solutions for decades \u2013 including the first ink-focused application, Journal, back on Tablet PC in 2002. Since then, we\u2019ve advanced ink capabilities across many apps. Whiteboard helps you collaborate in real-time together. OneNote helps you ink and edit text together on a rich canvas. PowerPoint helps you annotate your presentation or use ink to tell your story with Ink Replay. Many of our Windows OEM partners, including Surface, provide some of the best writing experiences in multiple form factors to suit your writing needs.<\/p>\n Today we are releasing a reimagined Journal<\/a>. Developed by Microsoft’s Applied Sciences Group<\/a>, this new version explores new paradigms centered around a personal, ink-first experience. We focused on this to help unlock new capabilities not possible with physical paper or seen in today in most inking applications. Our goal: explore how we can push new AI and new interaction techniques to make inking more delightful and accessible. To push this technology to stay out of your way while you write, while enabling new capabilities to make using digital ink invaluable.<\/p>\n Key Features<\/strong><\/p>\n *Subscription required, sold separately<\/p>\n <\/p>\n One of the most visible differences with Journal is that it\u2019s focused on pages.<\/p>\n We looked at all the ways you can hold a device when it\u2019s time to write. Portrait, landscape, adjacent to another app, and more. One pain point we saw with the infinite canvas approach. While powerful for brainstorming, it provides a lot of cognitive load when you are just trying to write ideas down as your content moves around a lot depending on orientation.<\/p>\n So instead of focusing on panning and zooming, we simplified to scrolling. We think it works great for providing a comfortable and consistent writing experience in many postures, and would love to know what you think!<\/p>\n We also created an experience optimized with ink as the primary medium. While many apps offer a mix of text and ink, we wanted to create a world where ink wasn\u2019t just a mode. Where we could introduce simplicity to the whole app to better meet the feel of normal paper, but still tap into the powers of what digital ink can do.<\/p>\n Since not all inking needs to be words you write, we added in support for adding images or importing PDFs so you can have a great ink annotation on top of these, too.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Another experience we wanted to improve is times that cause you to switch modes or switch postures of your pen. These moments seem small, but we found take you out of flow when you’re inking.<\/p>\n Today, many digital ink experiences can be cumbersome. Need to erase something? Switch to the eraser tool or flip the pen, and back to writing mode when you are done. Need to select something? Switch to Lasso mode or hold the side button of the pen. Both powerful capabilities, but not necessarily intuitive or fast.<\/p>\n There have been past attempts to solve some of these problems, but we took a fresh look, infusing new, locally accelerated AI to help deliver magical and useful experiences.<\/p>\n We made it simple and intuitive to erase quick spelling mistake with a scratch out. You can select content just by circling it or tapping with your finger.\u00a0All our gestures are powered by local AI, so for example it can recognize the difference between scratching out a word or shading in a diagram.<\/p>\n With our gestures, we wanted to focus on those moments to reduce the cognitive load of using digital ink so you can focus on your thoughts and your writing. We\u2019d love to hear if you find these helpful, or if you have other ideas or suggestions.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We wanted to create an inking experience that didn\u2019t require you to change the way you wrote but could be super-powered by it. With that in mind we tuned and trained our ink AI to automatically recognize and categorize what you write.<\/p>\n Journal can detect everyday writing like headings, items you starred, drawings, and of course, keywords. All the detection happens locally, so it\u2019s fast.<\/p>\n For the most part this recognition happens out of the way but does unlock some productive capabilities. For certain recognized ink, like drawings or headings, we\u2019ll put a little cue on the side of the page. You can tap it to quickly select the associated content and can then take actions like Move or Copy (as ink, or as Text). It also allows us to provide some great ways to navigate and find your content\u2026<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Paper can be a tough medium to compete with. Aside being familiar, it has great battery life and is always on. With digital ink we wanted to focus on an area where digital can do better: search and recall.<\/p>\n In Journal we\u2019ve created a new search experience, powered by ink AI.\u00a0With this we can help you rediscover past ink you\u2019ve created. Looking for a list you wrote? Filter on it. Want to find that sketch you made last month? Filter on it. By giving people a way to filter by the type of content they wrote we can unlock new ways to rediscover your past ideas.<\/p>\n We also created a new visual to browse search results: Cards. Cards make it faster and easier to skim the results and jump back to what you need. They can also provide a great Table of Contents view for headings you\u2019ve created.<\/p>\n These new experiences just work automatically \u2013 no need to change your writing style. No hidden gestures to unlock. We\u2019d especially love to hear how search and filter work for you, and any feedback you\u2019d have to make it more robust.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n For many, inking is just the beginning of something great. As ideas grow and take shape it becomes time to evolve them. Ink in Journal can be copied as Text or as Ink over apps like Office. We even made sure that if you snap Journal next to your favorite app you can still read and interact with your pages easily. You\u2019ll notice sometimes that ink-to-text conversion may miss some of your scribbles or shorthand \u2013 but no worries as you can quickly re-read your beautiful handwriting to correct quickly.<\/p>\n For Microsoft 365 work and school users, we also added in Calendar integration so you can take personal meeting notes with ease and use our new @ mention feature to privately refer to people. It\u2019s like digital shorthand.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-01-1.png\")
<\/p>\nBut first, a quick nod to our rich ink history<\/h3>\n
This time, it\u2019s personal<\/h3>\n
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![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-11.png\")
<\/p>\nTaking a page from… pages<\/h3>\n
An experience designed for ink first<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-12-1.png\")
<\/p>\nLook ma, no mode switches<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-18.png\")
<\/p>\nAn easier way to ink<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-14.png\")
<\/p>\nSimplifying search with filters<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Store-Frame-16.png\")
<\/p>\nIntegrated with Microsoft 365<\/h3>\n
So, what do you (th)ink<\/h3>\n