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Yoink for iPad and iPhone's App Icon

Today, Yoink for iPad and iPhone is 3 years old đŸ„ł. Time surely flies when you have
 bugs to fix.

It certainly doesn’t feel like three years. It feels like only yesterday, to be honest.
On the other hand, the release process, yes, that felt like it took three years, because I was eager to release alongside iOS 11 (which, due to its drag and drop capabilities, made Yoink for iOS possible in the first place), but there were some serious delays with App Review, who rejected the app multiple times because of its keyboard extension, and later, its File Provider (while other, similar keyboard/FP extensions were apparently perfectly fine and allowed on the App Store. This is my single biggest gripe with App Review – the inconsistencies in rejections. It’s obvious why these things happen, and it’s understandable, but it’s frustrating nonetheless).

But all that’s in the past. Yoink for iOS has been out there for three years now, and it has been doing great – thanks to all of you who use it, leave ratings, reviews or send feedback.
It’s been featured on the App Store on numerous occasions – here are a few examples:

Yoink featured on ios app store

Yoink iOS App Store Feature 17 09 2020 14 39 25

Yoink iOS iPhone App Store US Feature 07 12 2017 13 06 01

So thank you all for three amazing years. Let’s hope for many, many more đŸ€—

P.S.: Keep an eye out on my social channels (twitter | facebook | linkedin), as I’ll be posting a few promo codes there!

 

– Matthias
mail | website | twitter | instagram | facebook

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With iOS 14 comes a new privacy feature – a little banner at the top that shows you whenever an app accesses the clipboard.

Screenshot of iOS 14's Simulator showing the clipboard alert banner

I recently was asked in a tweet whether this was a bug. It’s not. It’s a feature 😉
But please let me explain in a little more detail what Yoink is doing here exactly.

Yoink accesses the clipboard without direct user-input in three cases:

Case 1 – Yoink’s Clipboard Bar

As you can see in the screenshot above, Yoink displays a small bar with the contents of the clipboard, allowing you to quickly store that content in Yoink (or, if it’s a URL pointing to a file, download that URL in Yoink).
To be able to display this bar, Yoink asks the clipboard whether it has new contents. It asks once when the app is put into the foreground, or regularly, in an interval whenever Yoink is used as a Side-by-Side or Slide-Over app (to be able to update the contents of the bar).

The clipboard bar comes in three settings (which can be changed in Settings.app > Yoink) :

  1. Ask
    This will make the clipboard bar appear whenever something new is on the clipboard (and will “monitor” the clipboard when the app is used as Slide-Over or Side-by-Side)
  2. Automatically store
    This turns off the clipboard bar, but will still check the clipboard for new content and automatically store it in Yoink.
  3. Never
    Turns off the clipboard bar and the auto-store feature, so the clipboard isn’t accessed

What I’m changing about this with the next update

Right now, the default setting is 1 – Always Ask for new clipboard content. This I want to keep, because I believe it to be a nice feature (and I’ve seen it used a lot).
However, I’m making it more obvious to turn it off, as you currently have to navigate into the Settings.app to change it.
So, whenever the ‘x’ button is pressed (to tell Yoink no, don’t store the clipboard’s current content right now), I’m asking the user directly if they’d like to keep the bar, turn it off, or always store new content automatically.
It’ll look something like this, after the bar has been dismissed:

Screenshot of new settings options

Case 2 – The Add from Clipboard Button

In Yoink’s top left corner sits the Add from Clipboard button. It is either active or not. To enable and disable it, Yoink queries the clipboard’s contents regularly (if it’s used in Slide-Over or Side-by-Side), and thus also causes the “clipboard accessed alert” to be shown.
It’s just a UI thing I thought would be neat, but ultimately, it’s unnecessary.

What I’m changing about this with the next update

I’ll remove the clipboard checking for this button and display an alert instead if there was nothing to be pasted on the clipboard.

Case 3 – Download a URL

Whenever you select “Download URL” from Yoink’s “+” menu, Yoink will check your pasteboard to see if you’ve copied a URL. If there is a URL, it’ll insert it automatically for you, if there isn’t, it leaves the URL field empty (and ignores the clipboard, of course).

Screenshot of Yoink's Download URL UI

What I’m changing about this with the next update

In iOS 14, Apple provides new API which allows developers to see if there might be a URL on the clipboard without actually accessing it. I’ll be using this going forward.

I hope that clears things up about Yoink’s usage of your clipboard.
And just to reiterate: I’m not interested in anybody’s data at all, and you can review my privacy policy here.

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Screenshot of Yoink being featured on the App Store for iPhone and iPad

I’m very happy to report that Yoink for iPad and iPhone is currently featured on the App Store! I have to say, I’m quite filled with joy about that.

To mark the occasion, I’m spontaneously holding a sale of both Yoink for iPad and iPhone, and Yoink for Mac for a limited time.

Yoink for iPad and iPhone on Sale

Yoink for iOS is about 35% off right now, dropping from $5.99 to $3.99.
You can purchase it here, and learn more about it here.

Yoink for Mac on Sale

Yoink for Mac is about 22% off right now, dropping from $7.99 to $5.99.
You can purchase it here, learn more about it here, or directly download a free, 15-day trial here.

In closing, I’d like to thank you all for your continued feedback on the app, making it better with every mail, tweet and review you send. I appreciate it immensely.

With warm regards,
– Matt

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Icon of Yoink for iPad and iPhone

Yoink v2.0.1 for iPad and iPhone brings many bug fixes and improvements, increasing the overall stability and performance of the app. It is a free update for existing customers.

Yoink Overview

What’s Yoink?

Yoink is your storage space (or “shelf”, as some would call it) for everything you’d like to keep around for a little while – text snippets, images, files – just about anything you wish.
Use drag and drop with Yoink as a Slide-Over or Side-by-Side app to store files, or use the Action/Share extension, the Today Widget or the File Provider to get files into Yoink.

Screenshot of Yoink running on iPad and iPhone

How does Yoink work?

The most obvious use case is to drag and drop files to it from other apps, like selected text, or images from websites, or emails, or map locations, just to name a few.
However, there are a number of ways to save files in Yoink:
– Yoink’s Share/Action extension shows up in almost any share sheet
– The Today widget lets you quickly store your clipboard’s contents
– In the Files app, you can drag and drop files to Yoink’s file provider (and actually do that from any app that supports iOS 11’s files browser)
– Siri Shortcuts help you save your clipboard’s contents or start downloads with a simple voice command, and without having to activate Yoink 

So, now that you’ve got all your files in Yoink, how can you get them out again?

– You can drag and drop anything from Yoink to any other app that supports drag and drop (and the dragged file types).
– Anything in Yoink can be copied to your clipboard.
– Yoink’s keyboard: Wherever you’re editing text, Yoink is right there with you – in the form of a keyboard.
On iPad, drag and drop items out to where you’d like them in your text; on iPhone tap to copy items.
– Yoink’s Today widget: Tap any item in the widget and it’s copied to your clipboard
– The file provider: Any app that support’s iOS 11’s Files browser can access items stored in Yoink
– Spotlight search: The system-wide search can find any item stored in Yoink and take you right to it in the app

What’s New in Yoink v2.0.1?

Being a maintenance update, there are no flashy new features. Instead, the update focuses on stability, reliability and performance.
Apart from fixing a couple of crashes, improving the reliability of iCloud sync and saving items in Yoink in general and many minor improvements and bug fixes, the update now (finally! – I know) fully supports the new iPads’ screen sizes, makes it easier to access Yoink’s settings and switch to Dark/Light mode, and, when sharing a URL to Yoink, it tries to figure out for you if you’d like to download a file, or just save the link in Yoink.
You can find the full list of changes on Yoink’s App Store page.

Pricing and Availability

Yoink for iPad and iPhone is available on the App Store for the price of $5.99 / ÂŁ5.99 / €6,99, with all features unlocked – there’s no subscription or in-app purchase. 

Yoink requires an iPad or iPhone that runs iOS 11 or newer. It’s available in English, German, Japanese, Simplified Chinese and Korean. More languages will follow.

Yoink is also available for (and originated on) Mac, exclusively available on the Mac App Store for the price of $6.99 / ÂŁ6.99 / €7,99, with a free, 15-day trial available on its website.

Links

Yoink for iPad and iPhone – Website
Yoink for iPad and iPhone – App Store
App Preview Video – “Add”
App Preview Video – “Drag out”
Yoink for iPad and iPhone – Usage Tips
Yoink for iPad and iPhone – Press Kit

Yoink for Mac – Website
Yoink for Mac – Mac App Store
Eternal Storms Software – Website
Eternal Storms Software – Blog
Eternal Storms Software – Twitter
Eternal Storms Software – YouTube
Eternal Storms Software – Facebook
Eternal Storms Software – Instagram

I’m looking forward to seeing and hearing what you think about this update. I hope you’ll enjoy it 🙂

If you have any feedback or questions, please don’t hesitate to write me!

With warm regards,
– Matt

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