I like the website, its simple and fast. Also love the idea.
Thank you! I'm trying to improve it daily so if you have any suggestion I would love to hear it.
do you have data on the hashtags? Wonder how useful it is.
Writing a book in public
51–60 of 68 posts
Re: Writing a book in public
#52Almost two years ago I started writing my short posts on a similar premise on my blog https://arcticloon.fi. In fact, as of today, I'm four days short of writing every day for two whole years.
And all this time I have been writing alone, mostly for myself. I do have a few loyal followers and I see some random readers every now and then.
I think a community of other writers would be a great next step for me, so maybe I'll join in. But I'm not sure if I'd like to switch my writing and publishing platform just yet. Hope it's ok for me to keep writing on my own site and copy the texts over. Who knows, maybe in time I'll switch over. Or even better start writing on both places every day, doubling my output.
Re: Writing a book in public
#53I wrote a book[1] - well - i wrote the same book 4 times again and again, writing, learning, throwing away, writing, iterrating, editing, rearranging, throwing away, starting new, iterrating, ... . Some learnings: I) just write first attemp i made a super fancy setup - google chrome book with custom linux installed that automatically transformed markdown via pandoc into a custom styled PDF everytime i saved. was fun…
Thanks for your advice, I'm currently starting down the path of writing (what I hope will become) a book. I'm at your piece of advice I). I'm working on a framework which links LaTeX and Python notebooks in a dynamic compilation setup [1], so reading your first point of advice makes me think I might have started on the wrong path. Did your setup ultimately prove useful in writing your book? Or did you give up part wa…
whenever i hid a rough patch during writing i started enhancing, debugging my setup. it was beautiful. it was a beautiful distraction. a beautiful, interresting timesink. my linux skills improved - a lot, but otherwise no, it did not prove usefull. i could have written a book about pandoc in the end, but that was not the goal.
in the end it was sublime (the software) and focus (not a software).
after the manuscript phase it went to google docs (one doc for each chapter) for structure and work together with the editor. then indesign for the triumvirate of me, the designer and the editor.
update: just looked at your https://github.com/poulter7/ipynb-tex, damn that looks familiar... I stand with my I) recommendation
Re: Writing a book in public
#54I like this idea and plan to give it a go, although I think you could be doing more to entice people to read each person's contributions besides just saying 'they wrote x words today, and it's called this, and it has these tags".
At the very least I think a super short blurb could be included, like a line or two (can be as short as a tweet or even shorter, you can take it from the beginning probably, just let the writer's own words attract people). Like it's either just the first sentence, or even the first half of a sentence, just something that has an opportunity to attract the end user.
I'd even consider a different emphasis. The title and the words are more important and should be more prominent than the author. The "@piotr wrote Strzelnica" makes it sound like they wrote a full piece, even though I think you should consider it to be more like a serial (i.e. 200 words in an ongoing work), and includes a redundant word "wrote" for each entry that's the assumed activity on your site.
I'd probably do something more like "Strzelnica 10" (10 being the number in the series), in larger and in bold, then the next few lines "Lorem ipsum...." the brief excerpt of text. Then at the bottom of that text, real small, the author's name, number of likes/feedbacks (one or the other), maybe a single tag, maybe the word count. But keep most of the other information on the entry itself. Maybe not even include the profile image.
If you really want the other information I recommend hiding it, because right now it all blends together and I don't get anything too interesting when I scan down the list of entries.
Anyway, my main concern is it looks too much like an engineer decided to include as much information as possible on these things, stuff that they would find interesting but most readers aren't really going to care about when scrolling through this and scanning for something to catch their eye, and I think more than anything the author's own words should catch the eye, not the 'info'.
But I'll still give it a try and hopefully it does well.
Re: Writing a book in public
#55I wrote a book[1] - well - i wrote the same book 4 times again and again, writing, learning, throwing away, writing, iterrating, editing, rearranging, throwing away, starting new, iterrating, ... . Some learnings: I) just write first attemp i made a super fancy setup - google chrome book with custom linux installed that automatically transformed markdown via pandoc into a custom styled PDF everytime i saved. was fun…
Thanks for your advice, I'm currently starting down the path of writing (what I hope will become) a book. I'm at your piece of advice I). I'm working on a framework which links LaTeX and Python notebooks in a dynamic compilation setup [1], so reading your first point of advice makes me think I might have started on the wrong path. Did your setup ultimately prove useful in writing your book? Or did you give up part wa…
I have written three scholarly history books [0] where custom Python code was used to generate TeX files (not LaTeX) that were then typeset into PDF.
Python's main purpose was to enable thousands of cross-references across the books, and to transform a large, every-changing text database into a pleasing output, where different parts of the database had different output formats.
Perhaps a TeX wizard could have done it all in pure TeX, but I never could have. Besides, who wants to learn all the intricacies of TeX/LaTeX when the task in Python is so straightforward? To this day, I can't imagine a different approach.
Joining the Python and TeX pieces together into simple scripts was trivial. The Python code evolved as I got into the books, so I would recommend a rapid-iteration model of code development, rather than building a perfect edifice before starting.
Re: Writing a book in public
#56I like the website, its simple and fast. Also love the idea.
Thank you! I'm trying to improve it daily so if you have any suggestion I would love to hear it.
Thanks for the work, I enjoyed trying it and loved the fact that indeed, 200 words is really achievable. I even did it twice ;)
Do you have any plan for the possibility to publish "privately"? I'd like to write, but I don't want/feel the need to be read.
I guess we could consider the drafts are private, but they seem like second-class citizens regarding streaks and so on.
Re: Writing a book in public
#57Am I the only one turned off by the very poor grammar on a post about writing a book? Are you writing the book in English?
Re: Writing a book in public
#58Just wrote my first 200 words.
I really like two major things about this site:
1. It's really simple UI/UX so you go straight to the point. 2. The Github like counter for your post.
I will definitely use the site more and more.
Re: Writing a book in public
#59I wrote a book[1] - well - i wrote the same book 4 times again and again, writing, learning, throwing away, writing, iterrating, editing, rearranging, throwing away, starting new, iterrating, ... . Some learnings: I) just write first attemp i made a super fancy setup - google chrome book with custom linux installed that automatically transformed markdown via pandoc into a custom styled PDF everytime i saved. was fun…
Just wanted to say that I really appreciated point II: I've been struggling with this ever since I left college (in which my final semester included a class on Later Wittgenstein). Do you have any other tips and suggestions on how to "stop Wittgensteining"?
When you write, imagine a charitable, intelligent reader who is interested in what you say and not looking to nit-pick every word.
Re: Writing a book in public
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
>1600 words per day is way too much for a regular worker who just started writing. I write a lot for work that's interspersed with a fair number of other activities as well. However, even on days when I'm more or less full-time writing with maybe a bit of add-on research and color for a topic I'm already familiar with, 1600 words is a lot . And I say that as someone who has written books. Personally, I'm more in the…
200 is still so hard for many people. I talked to users who tried the website and couldn't do more than a 1-day streak, they all say the same: I can't get into the habit / too much work / didn't plan it blablabla And I think this is the case for 80% people on earth. And I'm talking about english native speakers, non-native are even less likely to reach 200 words per day. Anywasy, thanks for sharing your experience! I…
200 words is a handful of paragraphs. If they can't do that, it's not about the quantity of words, it's about getting started at all.