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Why Bike?
First, Bike is an outliner.
That is, it's a text editor, where you indent to create a hierarchy. Once you have created that hierarchy you use outline commands to efficiently view and edit the hierarchy. It's a text editor with super powers!
I think outliners are the best way to write and think on a computer. I've spent my career building and refining outliners. Bike is the latest, and greatest, of those efforts.
Why Bike specifically?
Steve Jobs likened the computer to a bicycle for the mind.
I love that idea. Bikes are simple once you learn to balance. You can use them in many different ways. You can modify them to fit your needs.
“We were promised bicycles for the mind, but we got aircraft carriers instead”
– Jonathan Edwards
That's why I'm building Bike, specifically.
I want an outliner that is also a bicycle for the mind. Small enough to fully understand. Once understood it's flexible enough to be used for many purposes.
Bike's core is small, but designed for real work. It's a fast macOS native app. It easily handles large outlines that break other outliners. It's also fast at the basics–opening files, scrolling views, and resizing windows.
Bike is a pleasure to use.
Bike is also uniquely flexible. Built to be shaped with themes, scripts, shortcuts, extensions, and a command line interface. It uses well known file formats (Markdown, HTML), keeping your work open and accessible.
Bike is a simple and efficient outlining core that you can customize to fit your needs.