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Soulver 3 for iOS: Acqualia Software’s Unique Approach to Calculations Lands on the iPhone

Five years ago, Soulver 3, the sheet-based app that serves as a notepad for calculations, launched on the Mac with a long list of new features. In the years since, Acqualia Software launched an iPadOS version of the app and, today, an iOS version.

As I said in my review of the Mac app:

The strength of Soulver lies in its flexibility. Full-fledged spreadsheet apps like Numbers and Excel have their place. However, day-to-day life requires calculations that don’t demand that level of horsepower and benefit from contextualizing numbers with text. It’s the kind of math that happens in notebooks and on the back of envelopes. By combining elements of a text editor, spreadsheet, and plain English syntax, Soulver commits those easily-lost notebook scribblings to a format that allows for greater experimentation and easier sharing.

That’s as true of the iPhone version of Soulver as it was of the app’s other versions, perhaps more so. That’s because many people are more likely to have their iPhone with them than a Mac. With Soulver on iOS for the first time in a long time, it’s easier than ever to explore numerical ‘what-ifs.’ For example, what would my payment be if I refinanced my mortgage? How close am I to spending my budget for that party I’m planning? The possibilities go on and on.

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AppStories, Episode 139 – Interview: How Soulver Reimagined the Calculator with Its Creator, Zac Cohan→

This week, we are joined by developer Zac Cohan, the creator of Soulver, a combination notepad and calculator that reimagines how calculations are made on the Mac and iOS.

Sponsored by:

  • Luna Display – Turn any Mac or iPad into a wireless second display.
  • MacStadium – Get 50% off your first two months of a Mac mini subscription now with code APPSTORIES, or get started with MacStadium’s new Orka private cloud.
  • Linode – High-performance SSD Linux servers for all of your infrastructure needs. Get a $20 credit.

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Soulver 3 for Mac: The MacStories Review

The strength of Soulver lies in its flexibility. Full-fledged spreadsheet apps like Numbers and Excel have their place. However, day-to-day life requires calculations that don’t demand that level of horsepower and benefit from contextualizing numbers with text. It’s the kind of math that happens in notebooks and on the back of envelopes. By combining elements of a text editor, spreadsheet, and plain English syntax, Soulver commits those easily-lost notebook scribblings to a format that allows for greater experimentation and easier sharing.

During WWDC last week, Acqualia Software released a major update to the app. Soulver 3 for Mac features an updated design and substantial new functionality that I love. The app has never been easier to use, and its implementation of a sidebar to corral sheets is fantastic.

However, unlike its predecessor, version 3‘s file format is incompatible with the iOS version of the app and earlier Mac versions. Soulver also saves its data as a single ‘sheetbook’ file now, which means it can no longer save or manage sheets as individual files saved to arbitrary locations on your Mac. Both changes will be problematic for some users who may want to wait for future updates that the app’s developer has said are in the works.

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Soulver: A Notepad Calculator for Doing Calculations and Figuring Stuff Out [Sponsor]

If you’ve ever sat down with a pen and piece of paper to work out calculations, you’ll understand the power of Soulver immediately. The Mac and the iOS apps are part text editor, part calculator and work the way you think by letting you combine text and numbers on the same page.

For anyone who spends more time in a text editor than a spreadsheet app, Soulver is perfect. By mixing text and figures, a Soulver document becomes a roadmap making it easy to retrace your steps when you revisit your work later. Instead of guessing what all the numbers on a page mean, you can give each a descriptive label and add other text providing context. Writing calculations in plain English is faster than using a spreadsheet too because you don’t have to stop to consider what formulas to apply to which cells.

Best of all, Soulver approximates how you’d solve the same problems with a pen and paper, making it intuitive, but also better because the calculator is built right into the page. As you type on the left side of a document, Soulver keeps track of the math on the right-hand side with syntax highlighting that makes the calculations simple to follow.

Soulver is smart too. It keeps a running total of all lines in a document, and it can look up currency conversion rates, stock prices, and commodity values for things like gold and oil. The app handles all sorts of conversion rates too from weights to cooking units and much more. Students and programmers will appreciate features like the built-in trigonometry functions as well as the ability to calculate values in binary and hex.

To learn more, check out Soulver’s website or download both versions today from the Mac App Store and iOS App Store.

Our thanks to Soulver for sponsoring MacStories this week.

Soulver Updated with Split View Support and File Management Features

The iOS version of the calculator-replacement app, Soulver, received a big update today. The app, which combines elements of a text editor with a calculator, lets you work out problems the way you would describe them in writing. The latest version of Soulver, released earlier today, adds some key features for iPad users, greater cloud storage flexibility, and a host of other improvements.

For iPad users, Soulver has added support for Split View and Slide Over. Soulver is the perfect app to put in Split View as you reference other apps to collect numbers. I expect to get a lot of use out of this feature alone.

You no longer need to pick between storing your Soulver documents in iCloud or Dropbox. The app can now access documents in both cloud services and move items between them. If you enable support for both services, you can set one as the default in the app’s settings. You can also migrate documents from one service to the other from settings.

Soulver now supports importing from any file provider on your iOS device by long-pressing the plus button in the navigation bar and can recover deleted files from the trash by tapping the folder icon. Shake to undo, which is a nice trick, but not very discoverable, has also been abandoned in favor of a dedicated button in the navigation bar.

Flexibility is necessary for utilities like Soulver to remain relevant. With Split View support and more file management options, Soulver has laid a foundation for iOS 11 and beyond.

Soulver is available on the App Store.

Converting Multiple Currencies and Units with Soulver

I needed to convert a series of different currencies from a list to Euros tonight, and I thought that it would have been nice to have an app with natural language input for currency conversion. The problem was fairly trivial – a list of amounts to convert to EUR to get a total – but I didn’t want to alter my PCalc layout or come up with a workflow for all those variables. To my surprise, I learned that Soulver can convert multiple currencies and units at once without much effort.

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Soulver for iOS 7 Updated with iPad Support→

In late October, Aqualia’s Soulver was updated with iOS 7 support on the iPhone, and I noted how syntax highlighting ultimately made the app better than the iOS 6 version:

If you’ve used other iOS 7 apps like Byword, you know how syntax highlighting is beneficial to the user experience: numbers turn green, units are purple, operations are blue, and plain text is standard black. Syntax highlighting makes lines more scannable because operations and individual bits of text stand out more; furthermore, because Soulver allows you to type units manually (you can write “USD”, “usd”, “dollars”, etc) you’ll instantly know if what you typed has been recognized by the app thanks to color highlights. Besides being nice visually speaking, syntax highlighting — a simple addition in theory — makes the experience of using Soulver considerably better.

Today, Soulver 2.4 has been released with iPad support, making the app Universal. The iPad’s interface isn’t revolutionary – you still get a split layout but keys and number pads are larger on the iPad and you get easier access to some of the app’s features.

Soulver is a great app and on sale for a limited time at $1.99 on the App Store.

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Soulver for iPhone Updated for iOS 7 with Syntax Highlighting, More Unit Conversions, New UI

I’ve written about Soulver before: a calculator that isn’t really a calculator, Soulver lets you work with numbers for calculations and other operations using text commands across multiple lines. Soulver is, in a way, the Fantastical of calculators: using natural language, it lets you do quick calculations without having to tap dozens of buttons or scroll long menus. As the developers call it, Soulver is a “notepad calculator”.

Considering iOS 7’s focus on typography and legibility, I was looking forward to seeing how Acqualia would update Soulver (which is heavily text-based) to take advantage of the new OS, and I wasn’t disappointed. Version 2.3, released today, builds upon the app’s existing feature set to offer a redesigned interface (and icon), more unit conversations, and syntax highlighting.

If you’ve used other iOS 7 apps like Byword, you know how syntax highlighting is beneficial to the user experience: numbers turn green, units are purple, operations are blue, and plain text is standard black. Syntax highlighting makes lines more scannable because operations and individual bits of text stand out more; furthermore, because Soulver allows you to type units manually (you can write “USD”, “usd”, “dollars”, etc) you’ll instantly know if what you typed has been recognized by the app thanks to color highlights. Besides being nice visually speaking, syntax highlighting – a simple addition in theory – makes the experience of using Soulver considerably better.

With the update, Acqualia has added new unit conversion types, which come in handy for people who, like me, often trigger the app using a URL scheme that lets them type queries in apps like Drafts or Launch Center Pro. Like Fantastical, I’m faster at writing with natural language on my iPhone than tapping menus and lists, so the addition of more units allows me to use Soulver as the primary unit converter app on my device.

Soulver 2.3 includes other design improvements such as simplified navigation and easier access to total when the keyboard isn’t shown. The app hasn’t been updated on the iPad for almost a year now, and I hope that Acqualia is working on an iOS 7 update for that platform as well. Soulver 2.3 for iPhone is $2.99 on the App Store.

Soulver for iPhone Updated with iCloud Syncing, URL Scheme→

Soulver, my favorite iOS calculator app that isn’t really a calculator (I like another app for that), was updated today on the iPhone to support iCloud syncing, sub-folders, and a URL scheme. iCloud syncing was first brought to Soulver for Mac in December 2012, and now the iPhone app (Soulver for iPad hasn’t been updated yet) should be capable of syncing named documents with its Mac counterpart. If you trust iCloud with your Soulver documents, I guess that this will be a handy addition.

The URL scheme is much more interesting for my workflow. According to the release notes on iTunes, there’s now a URL scheme to launch Soulver, create a new document with text, or even to append text to an existing document. I am already thinking about the possibilities opened up by this feature for integration with apps like Launch Center Pro and Drafts – but I can’t find documentation anywhere. The app does support a soulver:// URL scheme, and hopefully more information will soon be posted on Acqualia’s website.

I’m looking forward to playing with Soulver’s URL scheme and updated preferences (not so much with iCloud sync). Soulver for iPhone is $2.99 on the App Store.

Update 9/1: The guys at Acqualia have posted a URL scheme documentation here. I have already set up a Drafts URL action that lets me quickly type a calculation in Drafts – which is my go-to text capturing tool – and append it as a new line to a specific Soulver document I have called “Calculations”. From Drafts:

soulver://new?text=[[draft]]&title=Calculations

I’m already using this action all the time to launch quick currency conversions in Soulver. Open Drafts, type “2 usd in eur”, and boom – Soulver opens, displaying the result. It’s a nice URL scheme.

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