Settings Mac

On Mac, access Settings from the Menu iA Writer → Settings or with the keyboard shortcut ⌘,. Settings are grouped into seven tabs.

General

Appearance

Choose between Light and Dark themes for iA Writer.

Dock icon

Choose whether to show the Light or Dark icon in the dock while running iA Writer.

File extensions

Show or hide the extension of your files in the Library.

Window

Various ways to set up the main window of Writer.

Titlebar

Choose if you always see the Title bar or if it fades in/out.

Toolbar

Choose if you always/never see the Toolbar or if it fades in/out.

Automation

Turn on support for URL commands URL Schemes.

Accounts

The + / - will add or remove blogging accounts. The Options... let you choose whether drafts for the selected account are posted in HTML or Markdown.

Files

Default extension

New files will be saved with the extension provided here. Common extensions are .txt, .text or .md for Markdown.

Preferred action

Determines the behavior of ⌘N; either create files in the currently shown folder of the Library or prompt for a save location upon ⌘S.

Saving

Enable or disable for “Ask to keep changes” when closing.

Library

Organizer

Choose which sections to display in the Organizer.

Files

Toggle these options to keep folders at the top of the library list, show text excerpts for each file and show or hide the Sort and Filter bars.

Sort by

Choose to sort documents in the library by modification date, name, or kind.

Editor

Text size

Adjust slider to desired text size.

Typography

Select the font between iA Mono, Duo or Quattro.

Language

Select language corresponding to the typography (for CJK optimization).

Line length limit

Select maximum characters per line (64, 72 or 80).

Advanced

Adjust indentation, tab key behavior, tab width, and treatment for wrapped line/whitespace.

Highlight color

Choose the color for the highlight function between yellow, orange, pink, purple, blue and green.

Completed tasks

Determines the appearance of a task when complete, either strikethrough, faded or both.

Focus scope

Determines the focus mode, between Sentence/Paragraph/Typewriter.

Syntax

Select parts of speech to be highlighted when Syntax Control is enabled.

Style Check

Select parts of speech to be crossed out when Style Check is enabled and add Custom Patterns to compliment built-in lists.

Spelling and grammar

Decide how iA Writer checks your spelling and grammar, if at all.

Smart substitutions

Copy/Paste

Automatically removes word-bordering whitespace.

Quotes

Replace straight quotes with curly quotes

Dashes

Two hyphens in a row are converted to an emdash

Text Replacement

Toggles replacements from  → System Settings → Keyboard → Text Input.

Templates

Center Headings

Toggle to center or left-justify headings (H1, H2, etc.)

Number Headings

Automatically number headings in Preview

Indent Paragraphs

Indicate new paragraphs with indentation instead of vertical space

Web Preview

Invert Colors: uses Night Mode when the Editor is in Day Mode and vice-versa.

Printing & PDF Export

Choose whether to include a Title page, headers and footers in your printed documents and exported PDFs.

Custom templates

Add or remove Custom Templates here using the +/- buttons or dragging them into the field.

Markdown

Metadata

To determine Global metadata, which has the lowest priority.

Library Paths & Links

Advanced settings for Wikilinks, Content Blocks or Hashtags.

Processing – Apply smart punctuation

Turn on to prettify punctuation in the Preview (e.g., Convert straight quotes in the editor to curly quotes in Preview)

Processing – Single return starts a new paragraph

Allows for “lazy paragraphs” by only requiring one return to create a new paragraph—instead of the usual two needed for Markdown documents

Settings