Working with text is sometimes annoying, especially when you copy and paste something with bad formatting. Boop is a free and open source Mac application by developer Ivan Mathy. The idea is to paste text here, transform it somehow with just a few keystrokes, and then copy it again into the app you’re using it in.
This is a little difficult to understand, so let’s talk about an example. If you have a block of text that is all uppercase and you want it to be different, you can paste the text into this application and apply the “Downcase” script to convert it. In no time, your text will be in lowercase.
You can select a script using the keyboard shortcut CMD+B or click on the Choose your action box at the top of the window. A pop-up window lets you search for a script, scroll with the arrows, and click Input to apply the script to your text.
If you want to get an overview of the scripts on offer, you can open the popup and type an asterisk and a full list will appear. You will also notice many scripts related to programming, which is the actual target audience of the app. However, I think it is also useful for writers. For example, my personal favorite scripts remove unnecessary line breaks, convert color codes, and replace smart quotes.
There’s also a collection of custom scripts that are easy to install – all you need to do is set up a folder for scripts in the settings and then download the scripts you want to use into that folder. The best script I found can convert CSV-formatted tables to Markdown; another can convert any text string into a hashtag.
This is the kind of application you probably won’t open often, but will be grateful for when you do. This is the best kind of application in my opinion: something that does some tasks very well and doesn’t demand your attention otherwise. Note that there is a ported Linux version if you’re not a Mac user.
