Meet Microsoft's new ink-first app, Journal

If you’re a Surface tablet owner or simply someone who prefers inking over a keyboard, you may be searching for an app that prioritizes the pen. For that, there’s a new Microsoft app: Journal.

Journal matters for two reasons. One, Microsoft is trying to offer everything pen and paper does, plus more. And second, Microsoft tends to migrate features—or gestures in this case—it develops inside individual apps to the greater Windows and app environment. It’s possible that Journal represents some future version of Windows.

Technically, Microsoft Journal is part of the Microsoft Garage, an app incubator that sometimes (but not always) produces a full-fledged application. Journal’s noteworthy because Microsoft designed it as an ink-first application. In reality, that means eliminating certain conventions: erasing e-ink by flipping the pen over or pressing a button, for example. Journal’s UI is also page-based. Finally, Journal “looks” at what you write, tries to figure out what it is you’re inking, and offers suggestions to manipulate that text.

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