@drequivalent @tuxedocomputers I wasn’t making fun of it; I was criticising it because I cared :) With Pop!_OS/Gnome Shell, I feel it’s reached a point where (a) I can use it and (b) I can hopefully contribute.

@aral @tuxedocomputers @drequivalent I'm interested in hearing whatever you do that way. May I recommend you learn Vala? It's designed very back-to-front for a language but it turned out very nice.

@drequivalent @aral @tuxedocomputers linux has usability issues when compared to macos. But it has come a long way and look at all the additional freedom and flexibility you are getting.

@drequivalent @aral Here's to the ability to change our minds! o/

@charly @tuxedocomputers Will do :)

@vickylai @tuxedocomputers Thanks, Vicky. All my deployments have been on Linux for yonks and I’ve always been playing with various distributions in VMs but Pop!_OS was the the first time I felt I could switch properly. That and my increasing disillusionment with every multibillion-dollar tech behemoth, including ones whose business models are different to Google/Facebook.

@aral

I shouldn't say I don't care about dev and design. Of course I do. What I mean is I don't do those things, primarily, and when I do it's very surface level. ;)

@wion @aral Looks like a simple Markdown writer as it seems. There are many for that…

@rugk

Yes, but not all .md editors are the same. Editors for coders that can do .md are a lot different than editors designed for writers (features and usability around that aspect of use).

Can you give me some examples to look at?

Also need a Scrivner replacement, but I think Manuskript will work for that.

Do you know of any replacements for these types of tools:

https://screenotate.com

https://glamdevelopment.com/outlinely

https://www.mellel.com/ (desktop publishing)

@aral

@wion @aral don't know that much… only saw FocusWriter on flatpak lately, that seems to be solely about writing (novels, or so) and not get distracted.
Also just searched the repo and found http://uberwriter.wolfvollprecht.de/ (which – from a first look – looks surprisingly similar to ) and "Marker" (which preents some tex-style graphs and formulars in the screenshots)

Let me know if you find some more or try one or another out.

(And as for screenshot tools there are yet even more.)

@rugk

Thanks. All noted for checking out.

@aral

@wion @aral if you could write about the features you need and why they're important someone may come and make one?..
Also there may be some cross platform alternatives

@charlag

I might do that. Won't be right away, though, a lot on my plate for the foreseeable future.

But for me, as far as a writer's text editor goes, nobody is doing it better right now than the folks at iA, except for one detail: no Textile. 😞

If I had the Linux equivalent of iA Writer but it supported Textile (including the advanced footnotes functionality the PHP version has) instead of Markdown, I would be in 7th heaven, as they say, as far as an quick text editor goes.

@aral

@wion @aral How about Focuswriter or Ghostwriter?

I don't use them myself, but I see them recommended fairly often.

Thing is, you really don't need anything fancy if all you want is to compose text. GNU Nano will do the job if you don't want to mess around with vim or emacs.

I prefer the joe editor. Run it with the jstar command, and you get an editor with WordStar-like key bindings.

@starbreaker

> How about Focuswriter or Ghostwriter?

Noted for checking out. Thanks.

> Thing is, you really don't need anything fancy if all you want is to compose text.

I've heard that a million times by linux bros. But the thing is, writing is a personal endeavour, just like coding, I'm sure. I can use a yellow Ticonderoga No. 2 on envelopes if I wanted to, but I'd rather use something more fitting and effective. Japanese carpenters don't use Stanley.

@aral

@wion @aral

You're welcome.

BTW, I understand how you feel concerning writing as a personal endeavor because I've written a few novels and short stories. I started out with a plain text editor because at the time it was all I had (on a 486 running DOS).

In my experience (naturally, your mileage may vary) there's a certain Zen in just firing up an editor you know reasonably well and bashing out text without even worrying about formatting or markup.

@Bromind @tuxedocomputers Hope you’re enjoying it :)

@aral @tuxedocomputers Yes, compared to my previous laptop, it's much better:D

@mrkikos @tuxedocomputers No, I won’t be setting my MacBook, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch on fire and dancing naked to the flames of their sweet demise :) I’m changing my main development machine to a Linux box. Better will still be maintained on Mac and iOS :)

@rickymorgue @Purism Not sure yet, I might just end up using Firefox with all the surveillance-by-default options turned off and DuckDuckGo as the browser. Will see…