Best way to read/follow knitting patterns and charts on a laptop?

March 3, 2018 3:21 PM

I would like to be able to follow along with my knitting patterns and charts on my laptop, and track my progress through the pattern.

I started knitting a few years ago, and I'm not super experienced (though I did just finish my first sweater :) ). I just started a pattern that has a chart but no written directions for the bulk of the piece. This is my first time working with a pattern with a chart. I understand the basic concept and can muddle through reading the chart itself, but I fear I will lose my place.

I knit without my glasses, which makes it very hard to read normal sized print while knitting. In the past I have copied the relevant text of my patterns from their PDFs into a TextEdit window, blown them up into a really big font, and followed along on screen in the TextEdit window. This also allowed me to highlight the line I was working on and therefore keep my place in the pattern. This works fine for patterns written out in normal text.

But it isn't going to work with this pattern, since most of it is in the chart.

A while back, I stumbled upon an app called KnitCompanion that has all sorts of tools to follow along on charts. This looks pretty cool, but it is only for phone/tablet. I have an iPhone but no iPad, and the iPhone screen is way too small for me to use for this kind of thing.

Does anyone know of something similar that I can use on my mac, or any other good way to approach this? For example, a good, easy-to-use PDF editor might work too. A quick search of the app store brings up lots of PDF editors and nothing promising under "knitting."

posted by 2 cats in the yard to Computers & Internet (8 answers total)

Best answer: This frustrates me too, and I’m working on a solution (MeMail me if you want details). I use JKnits on my iOS devices, and it worked OK on small screens if you orient it in landscape mode, but their latest update utterly broke multi-page chart functionality, and it doesn’t seem to be maintained. Give it a try if it”s only for one page?
My other suggestion is to use a PDF reader on your laptop, draw a rectangle around the row you’re working on, and drag the rectangle up every new row. It’s sort of like I would handle a print chart.
posted by third word on a random page at 3:34 PM on March 3, 2018 [2 favorites]

Best answer: I used to put a post-it note on my laptop screen. LOL.
posted by xyzzy at 3:53 PM on March 3, 2018 [3 favorites]

Best answer: I do a PDF with a brightly coloured line under the line I'm working on, and move the line up each row. I do it on my iPad, but there's no reason it won't work on a computer, too. Sometimes combined with a knitting counter app on my phone, depending on what I'm doing. (Like to keep track of number of repeated sections, etc.)

I prefer an underlining arrow to a box, because I often do double knitting, where you work from a different end of the chart depending on which direction you're going, so I have lines that echo the main background colour with an arrow for the direction, and can see at a glance what I'm supposed to be working with.
posted by modernhypatia at 3:54 PM on March 3, 2018

Best answer: I enlarge the pdf until the relevant chart is nice and big, and then (because I almost always am watching a movie or a netflix something while I'm knitting) I resize the window with what I'm watching in it, and use that to cover the lines I'm not yet up to, moving it up each row. It's not a perfect system, and it all goes to pieces if I forget to make a note of what row I'm up to when I finish up, but it works for me.
posted by glitter at 4:32 PM on March 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Those of you who mentioned marking up PDFs: what do you use to do this?
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 5:25 PM on March 3, 2018

Response by poster: Aha, looks like I can use Preview to draw a box around the relevant row, and move it as I move along. I'd still welcome any additional/better suggestions!
posted by 2 cats in the yard at 6:08 PM on March 3, 2018

Best answer: I take a screenshot of the pdf and open it in paint, then cross out each row. It’s definitely not ideal but gets the job done.
posted by pintapicasso at 8:10 AM on March 4, 2018

I print the chart and use Post It tape, it comes like regular tape and is perfect for knitting. I can't read a pattern in my tablet, it makes me crazy.
posted by chocolatetiara at 9:31 AM on March 4, 2018