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Time to talk about my writerdeck

veronicaexplains.net

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Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#191

Post by throw10920 »

michaelbuckbee wrote: post #69
CobrastanJorji wrote: post #50

This is an awesome setup. I like it, good job. That said, I do think there's a bit of irony to solving your "paying attention to writing" problem by setting up your OS from scratch, choosing to swap out the default networking stack, installing a novel flavor of your preferred text editor because you're "trying to get to know it a bit more," customizing your battery readouts, tweaking the login sequence, and then, aft…

It it reminds me of a lot of friends who wanted to "start blogging" and their first step was writing a new static site system from scratch.

Or friends who want to "make a game" and their first step is writing game engine from scratch.

I wouldn't be surprised if programmers had, collectively, written more game engines than actual games.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#192

Post by throw10920 »

There's a pattern that I notice a lot on HN.

"To solve this problem, I engineered an entire system from scratch."

Response: "That's a cool solution. But, isn't it a lot more work than this straightforward solution?" (the user is right - the complicated solution is massively more work than the straightforward one)

Response: "Yes, but it's a cool project - it's OK to not be the most efficient all the time." (also right - there's nothing wrong with doing projects with zero utility just for the fun of it, and this one actually does have some use)

It seems like there's a bifurcation of expectations.

Some people want to do a project, and they take a thin justification as an excuse to do so.

Other people really do want to solve a problem, but they get mired in perfectionism and overengineering, or aren't even aware of the simpler solution.

Conflation between these two categories keeps many HN threads gainfully employed.

(worth noting that for people in the latter category, pointing out "there's this simpler solution" can be incredibly helpful, because they simply might not know that it exists, or maybe they need a little bit of pushing to realize that they're overengineering things and that they got stuck in a place that they don't actually want to be in. this has been me, many many times)

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#193

Post by caconym_ »

daoboy wrote: post #6

I'm desperately awaiting the perfect eink device for this. I've got a great writing setup on Obsidian that really works for me, a royal kludge mechanical keyboard...just waiting on the next gen of eink The Boox One Note Max was sooo close, but they almost immediately discontinued the product and probably won't be supporting it long. Suggestions are welcome

The Pomera line of devices from the Japanese company "King Jim" (yeah, I don't know) are really nice from a features point of view: limited enough to stay out of your way when you're writing, functional enough to enable the basic workflows you'd expect e.g. basic file management, SD card/USB transfers (something that many/most/all Western boutique writing devices like the Freewrite somehow didn't support well or at all last time I checked). Somewhere I have a funky e-ink Pomera thing with a folding keyboard that I did a lot of writing on, and later I bought a DM250, which is not e-ink but works pretty much the same, and now has a US version. I recommend it.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#194

Post by caconym_ »

1shooner wrote: post #113
3eb7988a1663 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That looks really cool, but that price point. I could get a Steam Deck + travel keyboard and still come out ahead. Is that the true price for a low volume, niche product? Eink monopoly continues to make the world worse? Looked it up, and the original One Laptop per Child came in around $200

I was gifted a Traveler several years ago. It is overpriced and bound to the vendor data service for any connected functionality. You can read and write off of it via USB, but it doesn't actually use a true filesystem for your text files, it writes them into the main app's sqlite DB, which in the past has had data loss issues. My version uses ancient releases of Node and React for the UI for some horrible reason, and…

> bound to the vendor data service for any connected functionality.

This is why I don't own a Freewrite. It should be such a simple device, but they found a way to make it complicated and lock it into their proprietary ecosystem. No thanks.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#195

Post by fcarraldo »

throw10920 wrote: post #192

There's a pattern that I notice a lot on HN. "To solve this problem, I engineered an entire system from scratch." Response: "That's a cool solution. But, isn't it a lot more work than this straightforward solution?" (the user is right - the complicated solution is massively more work than the straightforward one) Response: "Yes, but it's a cool project - it's OK to not be the most efficient all the time." (also right…

Forums are made up of many individual people who all have their own perspectives. It is not all black and white, zero sum, good or bad.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#196

Post by throw10920 »

fcarraldo wrote: post #195
throw10920 wrote: post #192

There's a pattern that I notice a lot on HN. "To solve this problem, I engineered an entire system from scratch." Response: "That's a cool solution. But, isn't it a lot more work than this straightforward solution?" (the user is right - the complicated solution is massively more work than the straightforward one) Response: "Yes, but it's a cool project - it's OK to not be the most efficient all the time." (also right…

Forums are made up of many individual people who all have their own perspectives. It is not all black and white, zero sum, good or bad.

Right, I'm not saying any of those latter things. It's just interesting to note patterns, and sometimes people are actually in a local minimum that they appreciate being pushed out of.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#197

Post by wolvoleo »

cortesoft wrote: post #82
obsidianbases1 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pen and paper for writing. Computer for editing.

I hate handwriting with a passion. I have my whole life. I have horrible handwriting and my hand gets sore 5 seconds after I start writing. I am sure it is because I don't hold my pen/pencil correctly, but I think after 43 years I am not going to suddenly fix that.

Me too. And I can type so much faster and without thinking about it than I can write.

I've had many writing classes in school and different holders for the pen etc but I never managed to improve at all. Writing is just not for everyone.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#198

Post by wolvoleo »

chunkyks wrote: post #57
daoboy wrote: post #6

I'm desperately awaiting the perfect eink device for this. I've got a great writing setup on Obsidian that really works for me, a royal kludge mechanical keyboard...just waiting on the next gen of eink The Boox One Note Max was sooo close, but they almost immediately discontinued the product and probably won't be supporting it long. Suggestions are welcome

My wife bought one of these: https://getfreewrite.com/products/freewrite-traveler Reviews are wildly polarised. * Some folks find it to be the best thing ever [long battery life, the new patch makes the eink surprisingly fastly responsive, decent keyboard, no distractions] * While others find it terrible [it's still eink, that's a lot of money for a device that doesn't actually do much] You can find a selection of al…

Looks great but the price is pretty insane, and really the eink should be a lot bigger. So much wasted space on the bezels.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#199

Post by bitwize »

throw10920 wrote: post #191
michaelbuckbee wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It it reminds me of a lot of friends who wanted to "start blogging" and their first step was writing a new static site system from scratch.

Or friends who want to "make a game" and their first step is writing game engine from scratch. I wouldn't be surprised if programmers had, collectively, written more game engines than actual games.

Oh, that's exactly what I do. My rule is: one game, one engine. It's based on whatever the OS provides of course, or an abstraction layer like SDL, but everything above that is my own, tailored specifically to the game at hand.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#200

Post by troad »

It's interesting to me how few people seem willing to just turn off notifications.

I'm all on board with setting up a retro machine for fun, but if one wants to focus on writing, there are ways to achieve this that don't require the sacrifice of good font rendering, comfortable colours, etc.

The fact that the Music app notifies you of the new song is not some immovable law of nature...

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