Writing about Writing Part 3

There's nothing like coming back full circle. And I did, again!

Last time, I was excited to share how I created my own custom writing environment by enhancing Dropbox Paper with the Stylus Chrome plugin. As you’ll see below, the final result is pretty rad and I love it. It's a good setup for long-form writing. 

Stylus and Dropbox Paper

Let's see what we’re talking about. 

Of course, I didn't use it for very long. Did it work well? Did it look good? Sure! It was versatile and it looked really good. But in the end it became a problem, for the same reasons as before. I’m addicted to fine-tuning.

Every time I wrote something new, I would discover tiny shortcomings that I felt the urge to fix immediately. So, yes, I kept working on the style instead of writing. Reminds me of my blog…

Even worse, Dropbox decided to sunset their Dropbox Paper mobile apps. This is a major red flag and the final nail in the coffin of Dropbox Paper… I love this app, but not enough to use it with a mobile browser…

Now I have 2 missions. First, I must find a replacement for Dropbox Paper. Second, I must make sure it fulfills my weird writing requirements. Good luck…

So, I decided it was time to go on yet another journey—another rabbit hole, here—to find the ultimate app that would finally fulfill all my writing needs. Does it even exist?

Down the Abyss of Note Taking Apps

As most people know, Evernote has become an absurd piece of shit in the past 2 years, so we won't even consider it. Their free tier only allows sync with a single device. Yeah… sync with a single device. That’s not even sync. I’d rather use Notepad at that point.

Google Keep is awesome, especially since they added basic formatting such as headers, bold and italics. It's a welcome addition, but as a whole, Keep leans more toward quick notes and reminders than writing and editing. I’ll keep using it for groceries lists.

I tested a bunch of other apps like SimpleNote, Proton Docs, Standard Notes, Notion, Microsoft Loop, and many others. They were all good in their own right, but they didn't make the cut. They all missed something. 

Then I realized this: Part of the answer is markdown. Nice, we’re getting closer to something… But this is yet another rabbit hole! And down we go!

Typora and Marktext

When it comes to Markdown editors, there are a ton of choices. 

I noticed two of them because they are both really good and work really well. Typora and Marktext. Man these apps look good!

The majority of the other Markdown editors are web apps, and for the most part, they work well. They each fill a niche and shine at certain tasks that don’t necessarily align with my own requirements. Sure, I want to write and edit stories, articles, and anything else I can think of, but I’m not only looking for a clean interface with a lack of distractions. I also need an app with features that will help me through the process of writing something serious.

For example, I need an outline that’s easy to reach, such as the one that Dropbox Paper has. 

Let’s see where Markdown leads us!

Obsidian

Obsidian, man!

At first, I thought Obsidian was a note-taking app. Boy was I wrong. It’s an absolute beast of a platform. It’s a platform with which you’re able to build your dream writing environment. I took me a while to figure that out, trying to understand all the buzz around Obsidian. Then, somehow, things started to make sense.

You can use it for notes, long-form writing, brainstorming. You can link notes together, analyse their interactions with a graph view. You name it! That’s a good start.

At first, I did what I do best. I went nuts and installed a dozen plugins. Not a good idea. Obsidian itself already offers tons of options and possibilities. Cranking the complexity up to 11 on day one wasn’t a good idea. I got lost pretty quick and had to start over a couple of times. But I didn’t give up…

I decided to use Obsidian as it comes out of the box. I then proceeded to migrate all of my 250 notes out of Dropbox Paper. My best move in a long time. Obsidian is now my primary note-taking and writing app. A big win!

Here I am right here, right now, writing in Obsidian. Will this saga end here?

Will I use vanilla Obsidian for a long time? Who knows…

Endgame

In the end, a writing environment is a canvas. It’s a blank slate you’ll work with all along your writing adventure. It’s part of a process. It’s part of how you’ll get there…

So, in my mind, it has to be inspiring. It has to work alongside you to build and shape what you have in mind.

The more I think about it… The more I write about it… I become more and more convinced that my current canvas—and any of its past, present, future iterations—is never going to be a final, static product. It will live and evolve with me. So I have to make sure I build it using rock solid foundations that are versatile enough to adapt and follow me on my path.

Obsidian feels like the best tool for this job. Long live Obsidian!