Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Time to talk about my writerdeck

veronicaexplains.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 303 posts

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#221

Post by qsort »

jimbokun wrote: post #188
qsort wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to find the kind of person who likes both, but the ultimate CLI enabler is AI. Ironically, since the rise of actually useful agents I've been using less web and GUI stuff and more CLI. git, ssh, vim, tmux, psql, sqlite3, codex, claude. What more can I ask for? The "there's a unix pipeline for that" mentality that was technically true but ultimately impractical 5 years ago now works phenomenally well. I woul…

I agree that UX in the LLM age has been woefully under explored. I feel like whole new paradigms are waiting to be explored, but right now everyone is just trying to shoehorn AI into a corner of existing UIs.

100%. I use AI more than most and always with frontier models from OpenAI/Anthropic, but most of the AI features I see around are complete slop. Like why would I ever want to interact with slow, unresponsive JS popups and the cheapest tokens you could find when I'm already paying for actually good models?

At the same time the chat paradigm is very undercooked for any use case that isn't Google-like.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#222

Post by delis-thumbs-7e »

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.

”Friends”. Yeah, right.

(I admit, I am guilty).

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#223

Post by embedding-shape »

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.

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

Tailored to web developers, there definitively are more half-finished frameworks sitting on people's disks than finished web applications, I'm sure my ratio is pretty close to 1/1 over the years.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#224

Post by treavorpasan »

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.

Isn't this the definition of procrastination?

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#225

Post by simpaticoder »

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…

You didn't describe, but rather demonstrated, another aspect of the pattern which is that someone inevitably "goes meta" and remarks on the pattern - and usually someone points out that it's "not black and white" and the sub-thread decays into muttering obscurity with no real conclusion or insight. Personally I've come to see this as a niche form of "exuberance of the young" which is itself wasteful in the strictest sense, but is more generously characterized as a side-effect of other, hopefully more important personal maturation effects.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#226

Post by alexhans »

dredmorbius wrote: post #166
UncleSlacky wrote: post #94

Why not just use DOS? e.g.: https://github.com/lproven/usb-dos At least the laptops that can still run DOS natively tend to have fairly good keyboards...

You'd have to find a suitable editor. For a long time I had a copy of Wordperfect 4.x which I'd fire up occasionally under either DOSEmu or FreeDOS. Among other disappointments: - I've forgotten virtually all my WP muscle-memory. Vim is where it's at. (I was once quite proficient at WP, but the last time I used it significantly was well over 30 years ago.) - I find DOS apps tend to play poorly with any screen resolut…

When I saw this post I immediately thought of WordPerfect.

It had such a pleasant interface for that time.

But yeah, one of the things made me go for vim over Emacs a long time ago was its relationship with touch typing and not leaving the home row with the vim modes.

Learn Vim script the hard way [1], even if you didn't end up writing any actual vim script, was a game changer in terms of understanding the semantics.

[1] - https://learnvimscriptthehardway.stevelosh.com/ was

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#227

Post by MomsAVoxell »

I have been writing for some time now, on a very large variety of devices, and my current go-to is an iPad and keyboard .. at various times the smart thingy (from Apple) .. but also often now lately with a Bluetooth logi .. just to give the joints a bit of variety as they get older and crankier ..

I do miss the old typewriter. Not so much the selectric era, but more the well-balanced instrumentation of a manual.

Still, there is a lot to be said for the amber glow of full-screened vim session on such a portable device.

The one thing I truly wish for, is a solar-powered writerdeck, i.e. 100% off grid, forever. Just like the good ol’ typewriter ..

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#228

Post by Hackbraten »

chungusamongus wrote: post #101
skydhash wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. I only watch movies on my TV, play game on my PS4, and read novels on my Kobo. It’s not about productivity. Having a device tied to an activity is nice for attention and mental load.

You sound defensive.

It's a pretty common technique to maintain healthy boundaries, similar to how most employees don't use their private computer for work nor vice versa.

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#229

Post by lproven »

infinet wrote: post #170
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…

I guess I will setup something similar or more complex. But there are alternatives: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12114947 "George R.R. Martin Writes on a DOS-Based Word Processor From the 1980s". No internet, no multi tasking.

More less why I built this, TBH.

https://github.com/lproven/usb-dos

Re: Time to talk about my writerdeck

#230

Post by lproven »

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.

> my hand gets sore 5 seconds after I start writing.

Use a fountain pen. You can't press too hard: it bends and breaks the nib.

Disposable ones are good enough now, e.g. the Pilot V-Pen.

https://cultpens.com/products/pilot-vpen-v4-disposable-fount...

Post reply on HN