Scratchbay help

Getting started

Scratchbay lives in the notification area (the tray) at the right of the taskbar. The first time it starts, it lets you pick the shortcut to open your pads and leaves a few tips in pad 1.

• Left-click the tray icon, or press Ctrl+Alt+S, to open your pads with the cursor ready. Press Esc to close them.
• Right-click the icon for Pad 1–5, Settings, About / License and Quit.

In Settings › General, choose whether the pads open on The pad you used last or Always pad 1, and change the shortcut. If the icon is hidden under the ^ arrow, drag it onto the taskbar so it is always visible.

Working with pads

• Ctrl+1 to Ctrl+5 switch pads, Ctrl+Tab moves to the next one, and F6 moves between the tabs and the text.
• F5 inserts the date and time. Ctrl+Shift+C copies the whole pad.
• The More menu has Export…, Markdown styling, Clear pad… and Undo clear.

Give each pad a name and a color in Settings › Pads. Font, text size, monospace and spell check are in Settings › Editor.

Floating pads

Click the pin button (Pin as a floating window) on a pad to give it its own window. It stays on top of other windows unless you turn that off, can be resized, and collapses to a thin strip when you need the space. Scratchbay remembers where it was, even after a restart, and moves it back on screen if your monitors change.

While a pad floats, its tab in the tray panel shows a pin, with Show window and Bring back here. Closing the floating window also puts the pad back.

Clearing and undo

Undo has no limit: Ctrl+Z goes back through everything you did in a pad until you quit Scratchbay.

Clear pad… keeps a copy of the text first, so Undo clear brings it back, even after a restart. If you've typed since clearing, the old text comes back above the new text, so neither is lost.

For pads over 2,000 characters, Scratchbay asks before clearing. Turn that off with Ask before clearing a long pad in Settings › Data.

Markdown and large pads

Turn on Markdown styling for a pad, then press Ctrl+E to switch between the plain text and a styled view with headings, bold, italic, code, lists and checkboxes. Ticking a checkbox in the styled view changes the text, so Ctrl+Z undoes it. You always type in plain text.

Pads over 200,000 characters open in a fast read-only view, so a big paste never freezes the tray. It offers Undo paste and Edit anyway. Editing a pad that large can take a while to load, and spell check pauses for it. Copy all, Export and Clear keep working.

How saving works

There is nothing to save. Each change is written to disk the moment you make it, so text you typed is still there if Scratchbay or Windows stops suddenly. When Windows shuts down, Scratchbay finishes saving first, and after a Windows Update restart it comes back in the tray by itself.

In Settings › Data you can:

• Export all pads as separate .txt files (.md for Markdown pads), trial or not.
• Change Where pads are saved. Pads move to the new folder, which must not already hold Scratchbay pads.
• Turn Daily backups on or off. They keep a copy of your pads from each of the last 7 days.

Keyboard shortcuts

These work from anywhere in Windows while Scratchbay is running.

Trial and license

Scratchbay is free to try for 14 days, with everything turned on. After that: Pad 1 stays fully usable. Pads 2 to 5 become read-only, and you can still copy and export them.

Entering your license key

1. Buy a license. Your key appears on screen as soon as the payment goes through, and arrives by email.
2. In Scratchbay, open the License page in Settings.
3. Paste the key and choose Activate. The PC needs to be online for this step.

Using it on more than one PC

One key works on up to 3 PCs. To move it to a new PC, deactivate it on the old one from the License page first. If the old PC is gone, free up its place at Manage devices, using the email address you bought with or the key itself.

Once activated, Scratchbay works offline. When it's online it checks the license about once a week, so a refunded or revoked key stops working on its next check.

Bought Scratchbay in the Microsoft Store? The Store edition is licensed through your Microsoft account instead, and doesn't use a key.

Updates

To get the latest version, choose Check for updates in Scratchbay. It asks before installing anything.

Each update is checked against a fingerprint (SHA-256) before it runs, and installs over the current version without touching your data. Updates for the Microsoft Store edition come through the Store.

See what’s new in each version.

Your data and uninstalling

Scratchbay keeps its settings and data on your PC, in this folder (paste it into File Explorer’s address bar to open it):

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Hedgerow\Scratchbay

To back it up, quit Scratchbay and copy that folder.

To uninstall, open Windows Settings › Apps › Installed apps, find Scratchbay and choose Uninstall. The uninstaller asks whether to remove your data too.

Still stuck?

Email support@hedgerowapps.com and we’ll get back to you. Mention your Scratchbay version (shown in Settings › About) and your Windows version. More answers are on the support page.