
Taio’s Shortcuts-inspired macro system is bananas. For example, 1Writer supports JavaScript-based automations that allow me to do things like generate a link to an app in the App Store simply by typing its name. I’ve written shortcuts to do things like transmit my posts directly to Six Colors, and I want to use those in any text editor I adopt.īut beyond that, ideally any app will support some sort of macro system that will allow me to add scripts that create specific kinds of functionality. At a bare minimum, I should be able to easily kick off Shortcuts from within the app.
Markdown for mac full#
My ideal app doesn’t make me work to see a folder full of my in-progress writing projects.Īutomation. Sure, there are workarounds-I just don’t like them. Drafts is great, but it uses its own document database, which complicates editing stories created elsewhere.
Markdown for mac mac#
I don’t want to insult apps that do this, because they often have very good reasons to do so-Drafts being a prime example-but since I am not going to be writing in Drafts on my Mac (sorry, Drafts), the inability to easily sync with my Mac documents makes me unhappy. What I don’t want is an app that builds its own clever document database, making it difficult to load up a half-written item from Dropbox or pick up what I’ve written on the iPad when I return to my Mac. Right now, that’s a folder called Stories located in my Dropbox folder, but I’m open to using iCloud Drive instead. That means that any app I use on iOS needs to be able to sync with the same filesystem that I’m using on the Mac side. And I have preferred apps-most notably BBEdit-on the Mac side. As I’ve explained, I write on my Mac and on my iPad.
Markdown for mac pdf#
(And even better if I can define a template for the preview to use, as I can in Drafts and iAWriter.) For those who need to share files such as meeting notes with people who don’t speak Markdown, an easy export to PDF would also be nice.ĭocument syncing. And while I don’t require an in-app preview of my document rendered as HTML, it’s sure nice. This is extremely useful, because one content-management system I use doesn’t understand Markdown and requires me to paste HTML. 1Writer’s Copy command, for example, lets me choose whether I want to copy the plain text or an HTML version of my text. The app also needs to be able to convert the Markdown into HTML on command. 1Writer makes it very easy to export my document as Markdown or HTML. (Sorry, Ulysses and Craft.) I do appreciate syntax coloring and styling where appropriate-so that bolded text is bolded, and headings are prominent… so long as the app doesn’t swallow the markup that makes them so. I expect my Markdown editor to show me every single keystroke I enter, which means any attempt to hide hyperlinks will be met with immediate rejection. The App Store is littered with Markdown text editors, but not all Markdown implementations are created equal. I prefer Markdown syntax to coding HTML by hand-I find it more readable and less prone to errors-and at this point all of my published work is on the Web. Using a plain text format makes it easy to use pretty much any app, on Mac or iOS. I write in Markdown, and have for more than a decade. And of course, the frustrating thing is that different apps check different boxes, but none of them do it all! Craft hides hyperlinks, which is a dealbreaker for me. In trying out different writing tools on iOS, I’ve discovered that I actually have a checklist of features that I want. My quest for the perfect iPad text editor continues. On the iPad, though, I’m simply not satisfied. What I’m saying is, on my Mac I have a bunch of tried-and-true tools for writing- BBEdit for longer stories, MarsEdit for quick blog posts, Scrivener for longform projects. The same goes for Drafts, which gets a lot of things right but doesn’t quite fit into my workflow. I’ve been using 1Writer most of the time, but it’s also had a slow pace of development and has bugs and quirks that continue to frustrate me. Editorial, previously my writing tool of choice, is out because it’s basically been abandoned by its developer. It’s been a while since I described my writing process on iPad, and things have changed. And yet, somehow, the iPad provides more of a mental barrier for me, making it less likely I’ll peek over at Twitter or Slack while I’m in the middle of writing something. And, conversely, the iPad actually does make it easy to switch between apps. I know I can hide and quit apps on my Mac with a few keystrokes. I know I can run apps full-screen on my Mac-though a 27-inch iMac is spectacularly bad at that. I frequently write in my backyard and at my kitchen counter on an iPad.Īnd I feel more focused using iPadOS itself, for some reason. The mere act of getting up from my desk and switching away from my iMac can help me break out of a rut and be more productive. Searching for the perfect iOS Markdown writing tool
