I created a “Completed” tag that I applied to each section as I finished it. The screenshot below shows the completed content blocks for this article in my Ulysses library.
Wordstar for mac os series#
A block can be reused any number of times because your “document” is just a series of references back to independent blocks of text. Applications like Ulysses and IA Writer enable you to develop discrete blocks of content, then link them together at publication time. Flexible content blocks enable you to repurpose and remix your text. Flexible Content BlocksĪnother way craft writing tools differentiate themselves is by applying new models for thinking about and creating content. I simply indicated my intent with the #, -, and * symbols. The content looks exactly like I expected it would, but I never had to think about the formatting and styling when I was writing. Content formatting and text styling is indicated with a few easy-to-remember symbols. There are no toolbars, palettes or other controls in or around the window to distract you from the text. The screenshot below shows the editing window in Ulysses, a Markdown focused writing tool. Markdown has liberated text from the vagaries of its creation and in the process has created opportunities for new kinds of tools and document workflows. Text tagged with Markdown codes is to convert to HTML, the markup language used to format web pages.
Wordstar for mac os code#
Markdown files are artifact free and don’t require any licensed code to read. Markdown is the standard syntax (set of rules) that newer applications use to create these “universal” document files. The plain text files they produce are readable by other applications and humans, which makes them easy to transmit, import, and render. They do not enable you to layout complex pages. These tools generate plain text files that include support for basic formatting and font styling, as well as tables, images, math equations, and other common elements of personal and business documents.
One of the things that distinguishes the current generation of craft tools from earlier generations of word processing applications is they are primarily focused on helping create text that will render properly on screens instead of paper. It’s like playing the game Telephone-things always get scrambled along the way.Īs digital first content distribution has grown in importance, how text is rendered on-screen has also grown in importance. We’ve all had the experience of copying text from one application to another, only to find that the styling and formatting information isn’t anything like the original. Other applications may not understand how the styling and layout information is encoded either. What’s not visible to you (the author) is what’s going on beneath the surface of the document-the way the style and layout information is encoded in the document file. But WSYSIWYG presents challenges when you’re distributing a file that will be read and displayed (rendered) by other applications, such as a web browser. WSYSIWYG presentation is great for users planning on printing their work, or distributing a digital facsimile of the printed version (a PDF). There’s no guessing on how the various formatting and styling codes will be interpreted. The WSYSIWYG version looks the way the final printed version will look. It was a turning point in how we interact with computers.īefore the Macintosh, most word processing applications looked something like this: The Trouble with WYSIWYGīuilding on ideas developed by the team at Xerox PARC, in 1984 the Apple Macintosh introduced the public to the first standard graphical user interface and What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) writing application. Instead, I hope you’ll finish with an appreciation for the different approaches these tools take to writing and an interest in exploring a few on your own. Along the way I mention several popular craft writing apps and services, but you won’t find any product reviews or recommendations. This post focuses on craft writing tools and the attributes that distinguish craft writing tools from traditional word processing applications. The second article in the series looks at how Microsoft Word evolved from a basic word processing tool to a sophisticated page layout tool-and why those changes made the application harder to use and less suitable for creative thinking and writing. It also introduces the concept of “craft workflows”-the individualized processes and tools creatives use to research, create, and distribute the work.
Wordstar for mac os software#
The first article in the series, Software Tools, Creative Thinking, And Craft Workflows explores the ways software tools shape our creative thinking and writing processes. This is the third installment in a series on how software applications shape our creative thinking.
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