51–60 of 64 posts
It's hard for me to see the advantage of using one of these over pen and paper: - distraction free (except doodling) - lower power consumption - expressive in a way that typing can never be - tends to discourage editing as you write edit: and less eye strain
Ergonomics. I can type for far longer than I can write by hand.
It's hard for me to see the advantage of using one of these over pen and paper: - distraction free (except doodling) - lower power consumption - expressive in a way that typing can never be - tends to discourage editing as you write edit: and less eye strain
it's the same kind of "workflow optimization" that notion and obsidian users suffer from. You spend so much time making your tools more productive but don't get any actual work done.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't use anything like a "writer deck" but for me pen and paper is a non-starter due to hand fatigue. I can type for much, much longer periods than I could ever hope to write by hand.
> but for me pen and paper is a non-starter due to hand fatigue You may want to look into writing with your arm instead of your hand
They have 1 thing wrong: there's nothing virtual about the DOS on my USB keys. 100% the real thing, on the metal.
I am hoping that someone (maybe me!) will make a "write/program in the sun"-friendly e-ink Linux computer, A5 sized. Use cases: Patio bars in Austin Texas, sunny Medellin Colombia, outside plaza cafes in Barcelona. Thank you!
The refresh rate on e ink makes them awkward for coding. Scrolling through a text file or terminal window. Browsing files. Etc. Web dev would be very cumbersome. Everything gets slowed by it. Even typing fluently feels rough at less than 1Hz. We need a biiiiig improvement in e ink displays before any products like what you describe could be good.
I am hoping that someone (maybe me!) will make a "write/program in the sun"-friendly e-ink Linux computer, A5 sized. Use cases: Patio bars in Austin Texas, sunny Medellin Colombia, outside plaza cafes in Barcelona. Thank you!
Expensive: Daylight Computer. Less expensive: PineNote. Pair with a Bluetooth keyboard.
I use an Alphasmart Neo to write my novels. It's incredibly easy to focus with such a machine. If it just had bigger storage capacity and a microSD slot I'd never consider another option.
What part of your writing requires so much storage? I thought the alphasmart only did text files.
I used to try and optimize my distraction-free writing setup, until I realized that by doing so I was distracting myself from writing. I’ve come to realize that if you want to write, then just write. It sounds oversimplified, but that’s the crux of it. Once you get over the initial hill and form the habit of writing, tools no longer matter.
There are a lot of hobbies like that. More than half of woodworking discussions are not about woodworking, but how to setup a great shop and what tools to put into it. Musicians often talk about and trade guitars more than play. Sewing is often more about collecting fabric than doing something with it. That is just a short random example, there are plenty of more. None of the above are bad things. There is nothing wr…
My 'writer deck' is an old 11" 2014 Macbook Air with no wifi enabled, running Linux Mint. It only has a few apps. Beautiful machine, works perfectly. I paid $35 for it. And by 'no wifi enabled', I mean it's not enabled in the OS, so I can't even be tempted to turn it on. When I need to sync files/update, I have a USB ethernet dongle. I love refurbishing old Macbooks/ThinkPads, and I always tell people just buy one, c…
I think an ideal set up for me would be if I could boot my laptop to an different user on the same os where I only had 1 or 2 apps: Obsidian for notes, and possibly an e-reader for some use cases. Then somehow put a timed lock out on the main os/user. That way I could set a period of time where I was locked into that task, but I wouldn't need a dedicated device