Unofficial Version for Big Sur

If you're on MacOS Big Sur and you're having issues with Plover, try this new unofficial build by Discord user Sammdot. Hopefully it'll do the trick!

Plover and Steno Explained

Check out this amazing video from Aerick! It's so clear and eloquent, with phenomenal graphics, concise explanations of how steno works in just the right amount of detail for a total novice, and it's even captioned! Spread it far and wide!

Public Domain Steno Practice

Nael on the Plover Discord recently dug up a cool resource for text-based practice: Typelit, which allows you to pick a public domain book to type your way through as you read it. Great for drilling, dictionary building, and not being bored out of your skull! I'd recommend A Journal of the Plague Year, which used to be one of my favorites back in high school, but... Perhaps let that one sit on the shelf a while longer. Maybe go for something light and fluffy, like Moby-Dick, instead.

Qwertysteno down, but we're working on it!

Invaluable steno learning resource qwertysteno is down, but I've contacted the developer and am waiting back to hear from him. If the Open Steno community can help in any way (financially or otherwise) to keep Qwertysteno alive, rest assured that we will do what it takes.

Two-Word Phrases

Would you like a spreadsheet of common two-word phrases, arranged by frequency according to Google's n-gram data (so from a written rather than a spoken corpus, which may or may not be what you're looking for, depending on your own particular use case)? Here's a spreadsheet of them!, helpfully compiled by Quetzal from the Plover Discord. I wouldn't necessarily run yourself ragged trying to figure out briefs for every last one of these ("free beast"? "of sewage"? "desserts and"? I think those can all safely be multi-strokers.), and keep in mind that as with any list of search engine terms, there's a fair bit of NSFW words in there, but at least trying to get some short versions of the top fifty or a hundred phrases or so might well be fairly helpful!

Wanna Argue About Steno on Reddit?

Then I've got just the link for you! I'm way too wrung out and overwhelmed these days to dive into a combative forum and rehash all those well-worn debates, but if it's the sort of thing you find enjoyable, have fun!

Be Extremely Internet on Your Steno Machine

A bold new plugin has arrived from Discord user psethwick: Plover Fancytext, which allows you to use Plover to output text in various (mostly joke, mostly unicode) text formats:

bubble: ⓑⓤⓑⓑⓛⓔ
crytyping: I' finne,,, h ddon'nt w,,,orry about me, re,,el yy
fullwidth: ｖａｐｏｒｗａｖｅ
medieval: 𝕸𝖊𝖉𝖎𝖊𝖛𝖆𝖑
sarcasm: wELl ThIs IS cONvEnIeNt
upsidedown: ndsᴉpǝ poʍu
zalgo: z̓ä́l̘g̩̚o͡t́èx͓͠ẗ̬

This is hilarious and I love it. That is all.