A Refresh Is Coming to Tortuba

Tortuba has been logging dives since 2012. The app you can download today still does what it always did: a playful logbook, an offline guide to 10,000 species, signatures and stamps from your instructors, stories coaxed out of you by a toothy Shakespeare.

The version 4.0 release notes ended with a promise: “The old look & feel remains the same… for now!” I am finally ready to say something about the “for now.”

What I can confirm

A brand-new UI. The current design has served divers well, but it predates a lot of what modern iPhones and iPads can do. The refresh rebuilds the interface from the seabed up. Same spirit — simple, playful, a logbook you actually want to fill — new everything else.

Cloud sync. The old Tortuba web app closed years ago, and since then your logbook has lived on one device. That ends. Cloud sync will carry your dives across your devices, so the log on your iPhone and the one on your iPad are the same log.

A few surprises. I am keeping those under the surface for now.

What happens to your logbook

It carries over. Your dives, your species sightings, your signatures — the log you have been keeping is the log you will keep. I am a diver too; I know exactly how it would feel to lose a logbook, which is why “your existing logbook will carry over” was a requirement before a single screen was designed.

What stays the same

The ideas Tortuba was built on are not changing:

• A log you love to fill. If logging feels like homework, divers stop. Everything I build gets tested against that.
• Offline first. Dive boats do not have signal. The species guide and the logbook keep working three days from shore.
• The fish matter. Tortuba has always been more than dive numbers — it is remembering the fish you saw and where you saw it, and being proud to share it. That is the heart of the app, and of the Tortuba Index I am building alongside it.

While you wait

The best thing you can do before the refresh lands is simple: keep logging. Every dive you record now comes along for the ride. If your habit has lapsed, my guide on how to log a scuba dive will restart it in about two minutes per dive — and if you are still weighing formats, I compared paper and digital logbooks honestly.

I will share more when there is more to share. Until then: dive, log, and give a fish a nickname for me.