Aha! Ideas | Text editor
You probably spend more time in the Aha! Ideas text editor than anywhere else in the application. The text editor is where you fill in a description for an idea, craft empathy sessions, collaborate on ideas through public and private comments, and assign to-dos and approvals.
In this article, we will walk you through some of the key features of the text editor. If you are already familiar with the text editor and want to focus on using it more efficiently, you might be interested in text editor shortcuts.
Click any of the following links to skip ahead:
The text editor toolbar
If you are new to the Aha! Ideas text editor, let's start with a tour of the toolbar at the top.
The toolbar adjusts to fit the width of your screen, so if you view Aha! Roadmaps records on different screens — or view the same record in its details or drawer view — the toolbar might look slightly different for you.
In this table, we will walk you through the text editor toolbar in its expanded form. View an Aha! Roadmaps record in its detail view to follow along!
Note: You can use shortcuts to access many elements on the text editor toolbar.
Icon | Name | Options | Drawer view | Function |
| Formatting |
| Format your selected text into paragraphs, headers, preformatted code blocks, or pull quotes. | |
| Bold | Collapses into the Font style menu | Bold your text | |
| Italics | Collapses into the Font style menu | Italicize your text | |
| Underline | Collapses into the Font style menu | Underline your text | |
| Strikethrough | Collapses into the Font style menu |
| |
| Code snippet | Collapses into the Font style menu | Put your text in a | |
| Text color | Text color
Text highlight
| Change the color of your text, or highlight it. | |
| Clear formatting | Collapses into the Font style menu | Clear all formatting from your selected text. | |
| Alignment |
| Align your text:
| |
| List | Insert a list:
Adjust a list's indentation:
| Insert a list or adjust a list element's indentation. | |
| Table |
| Collapses into the More menu | Insert a table into the text editor. |
| Insert link | Collapses into the More menu | Insert a hyperlink into the text editor. You can use | |
| More menu |
|
| |
| Insert media | Collapses into the More menu | Insert an image, audio, or video file into your text editor, and attach it to the Aha! Ideas record. You and your team can comment directly on media attached to Aha! Ideas records. | |
| Draft with AI |
| Create new content and improve existing content with the assistance of AI. | |
| View history | View a history of all changes made to your text editor. | ||
| Comments |
| You and your team can comment inline on the text editor. Choose whether to show or hide those comments. | |
| Fullscreen |
| Choose to expand the text editor to fit your screen, or collapse it back to its default size. |
Use visual styling options
Form follows function. You will use the Aha! Ideas text editor to document some of your most important work — from innovative ideas to insightful empathy session discussion guides. So format your writing to guide your audience, emphasize your conclusions, and build a convincing narrative.
Add a Table of contents so that your audience can skip ahead to a relevant section. Use header formatting for different sections of your work, then enable the table of contents (in the More + menu).
Click any link to jump to a specific section
Click the icon in the upper right to collapse it.
Insert a link with
#topas the URL to jump your audience from a section of the text editor back up to the table of contents.
Use Callout boxes to highlight critical copy. Select Callout box in the More + menu, then choose from one of four options: Information, Note, Warning, or Tip. Each have their own background color, to draw your audience's eyes to different types of messages.
Insert Images to visualize information, then comment on them directly in threaded conversations.
Add Labels to organize lists and update statuses. Highlight text, open the More + menu, click Label, then select a color. For example, you may want to visually communicate that a task has been completed.
Note: You can also directly mention Aha! Ideas records by typing the # key, followed by the name or ID of the record.
Real-time collaborative editing
For certain record types in Aha! Ideas, multiple users can simultaneously edit and see other users editing in the text editor. When more than one user is present in the same editing session, other participants are shown as flags that display the users' names. The flags move in real time as other users make updates in the text editor.
To begin collaborative editing, start by modifying a description field where your fellow collaborators are currently adding content.
Note: Real-time collaboration is currently available in description fields for empathy sessions and custom note fields. It is not available for ideas, in comments, or in records' creation modals.
The text editor also provides a variety of tools to help you collaborate with your teammates.
Reference other users and link records together with # and @mentions. Notify your collaborators of a record or note by typing the @ key followed by the user’s name. Add links to other records by typing the # key, which will let you look up an issue directly from the text editor using either the reference ID or name of the record.
Highlight and change the color of your text by selecting the text that you would like to change, then click the Formatting dropdown to pick the color.
Add lists by clicking the List dropdown and selecting numbered, bulleted, or checkbox lists.
Share a direct link to the record — or to a full-screen view of the text editor itself. Once you have clicked the Enter full-screen mode icon in the top-right corner of the text editor, copy the URL from your browser and share it with any user with access to your workspace. Their browser will skip them straight to a full-screen view.
Comment directly on text
The words we write often need to be reviewed for accuracy, tone, and focus. But giving clear feedback can be difficult. Inline text comments let you highlight and comment on the exact parts of the text you want to address, then create conversation threads to focus on and resolve the issue.
To create a new inline comment, highlight the text you want to comment on and click the Add comment + icon that appears on the right side of the text editor. Your text will be highlighted and underlined in orange, the Comments sidebar will appear, and you can start creating your comment. Click Save comment once you are done.
Resolved comments will be highlighted and underlined in green and you can always reply to a resolved comment to reopen it.
Inline comments have access to the full text editor, so feel free to format your text, @ and #mention Aha! Ideas users and records, add and color tables, or insert images.
Floating menu and full-screen mode
You have likely seen it while browsing the internet — a menu that “sticks” to the top of your window as you scroll down a page. This ensures that you never have to scroll back to the top of a page when you need the toolbar. The menu is always floating there, waiting to be used, as you scroll down the page.
Click the full-screen arrows icon on the text editor toolbar to expand the note or description to the full height and width of your browser window. As you scroll, the text editor toolbar will remain at the top of your screen.
Embed a whiteboard
You can embed a whiteboard directly into your note or the description of your feature, requirement, or initiative to add diagrams, sketches, and other visuals alongside text.
Click + on the text editor toolbar and select Whiteboard while editing a record description. A new whiteboard will be added below your cursor. Click the pencil icon to edit the whiteboard. When you are finished editing the whiteboard, click the X to exit and return to editing your note or description. To remove an embedded whiteboard, click the trashcan icon and click to confirm that you would like to delete it.
Draft and improve text with AI
You can use the artificial intelligence (AI) writing assistant in Aha! Ideas to help you create clear, polished text in the right tone — so that you can communicate effectively without spending extra time and effort. Use AI to draft emails to customers, refine what you have already written, summarize long passages, and more.
Click the wand icon on your toolbar to prompt AI to generate a first draft of your text in a note, record description, or comment. Highlight existing text and click the wand to prompt AI to apply changes in tone, summarize passages, make formatting changes, and more.
Note: You can use AI when drafting comments within Aha! Ideas. AI is not available when leaving comments from your ideas portal.
Add and comment on media
You can add images, audio, and videos inline so you do not need to attach additional documentation with rich media. Simply click the Image icon from the text editor toolbar, choose your image, audio, or video file, and click Attach. The file will appear inline. When you insert a video or audio file, anyone who can view the note or record you have added it to can press the play button to listen or watch the embedded media.
The text editor also supports copy/paste and drag-and-drop for quickly adding media.
Note: Inserting media will add it both inline and as an attachment to the record.
To comment on an inserted media file, highlight it inline and add your comment. You can also comment on images attached to Aha! Ideas records.
When you add an image or video, grab the edges to resize it depending on the level of detail you need.
Note: Supported audio file types include mp3, .wav, and .ogg. Supported video files include .mp4, .webm, and .ogv and should be under 300MB.
Add and modify tables
To insert a table, place your cursor in the location where you would like the table to appear. Then click the table icon on the text editor toolbar and use the grid of cells to highlight the number of rows and columns that you need.
The table will automatically size itself to fit the dimensions of your text, images, or links. You can resize the table by dragging any of the borders of your table.
Modify the table by clicking on a cell or highlighting a group of cells, then clicking the dropdown in the top-right corner of a cell. From this dropdown, you can merge cells, split cells, adjust the cell text's vertical alignment (top, middle, bottom), add and remove rows/columns, clear table contents, or delete the table.
You can also customize the look of your table by adding background colors to cells, rows, and columns. Select the cells you want to color, click the table dropdown in the corner of a selected cell, then click Cell background color to select from one of 70 colors.
Note: If your background color makes it hard to read your text, you can change your text color to white.
Track history and restore historical versions
The text editor tracks the history of changes made to a record or record's description. To view the record of changes and the user(s) who made them, click the history icon on the text editor toolbar.
During a collaborative session that involves multiple users, each user that modified the document will be displayed in the history of the record.
To restore a previous version, simply select one of the historical versions of your document and choose Revert to this version.