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576

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 03:03 PM »

Could also help: Many code editors let you tweak and toogle between different themes and highlight schemes. So one could use one where the format pops at times and one more discreet at other times. VS Code and other editors also have a quick toggle for zen mode (minimal mode, distraction free mode, ...) that hides most toolbars and buttons.

-Nod5 (May 28, 2020, 02:33 PM)

Yes. I'm already looking to check out text editors. From this thread, I have  Vim, neovim - with warning of steep learning curve, VSCode, Notepad++, and iirc UltraEdit and EditPad from another thread. I will search for other contenders.

I know that I won't cope with a steep learning curve unless I  can extend the time can work on a PC. And I have no experience of text editors,  though I think I did have Crimson in the past. Which leaves me wanting one thats intuitive and easy to learn and where I can switch off or ignore all functions that relate only to programming or programming languages. I remember Superboyac writing that EditPad was more intuitive than UltraEdit.

I don't actually need what most people consider distraction free, it makes no difference to me at all. But intrusions in the actual text are another thing completely.

Fiction,  fact, academic,  report are all the same to me. I need to work with the pure prose. Equations, graphs, tables, diagrams, images etc can all be separate - I'm used to journals that require them as separate pages.

Notes, journalese and web (if I did it, and I don't rule the possibility out) can include as much formatting as Markdown wants to throw at it without it impacting me at all. Attempted perfection never competes with speed for them.

577

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 02:36 PM »

Some forums and other social media already use Markdown (see *Diaspora and Discourse)

-wraith808 (May 28, 2020, 09:23 AM)

If Markdown takes over the world,  I assume that all forums will switch to it.
Of course, it would have to be markdown with BBCode extensions.

578

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 11:12 AM »

After reading that, I'd think that if you can get around the need for having editable markdown, https://hackmd.io would be stellar for this!

-wraith808 (May 27, 2020, 01:31 PM)

If you want to be able to edit in the preview, Texts does just that, which is the reason that I don't use it.  I like to have my hands on the actual text of the document, but this software does it WYSIWYG and the backing file is just Markdown.

-wraith808 (May 27, 2020, 10:56 AM)

For writing writing, txt is fine 99% of the time. I can do other bits separately.
For notes etc, I have no problem with markdown being visible as I write.

But for editing I have very specific requirements. I need colour. I need to be able to highlight etc with mouse or pen. I need comments and bookmarks.  And versions. And I need to be looking at what I'm working on not markup tags I haven't just added myself. And more probably.

I still won't care about the document formatting because that's the next stage. And I'm not sure there's an alternative to the infinite tweak/preview cycle there.

579

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 10:52 AM »

here is just a quick comment on reading Markdown text directly: I find it very easy after only a little practice

-Nod5 (May 27, 2020, 10:37 AM)

Maybe.
Well I think it will depend on the content.
The example you gave is 'choppy': every element is saying "here I am" and "this is how I relate" to the other elements closeby. If you were asked what you'd read today,  you wouldn't answer with something like this. There's no flow in the language,  no subtle interplay between words or content.

I agree with the example,  I have no problem with markdown for notes because it's not a distraction. But I do when I'm working on prose and I need to focus on the relationship between the content and language and how it flows and progresses.

580

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 10:22 AM »

I learned something.  Never heard of transclusion before.  For any in that same boat: Transclusion

-wraith808 (May 28, 2020, 09:25 AM)

I knew it had to be a clever programming idea.
It's rather like the motor industry supply chain.

581

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 10:16 AM »

too off-topic

-Nod5 (May 28, 2020, 06:00 AM)

Too off-topic can't exist if you have made a link.
 

582

General Software Discussion / Tags

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 09:27 AM »

My thinking has evolved. As mentioned above, I believed it needed to be systematic to avoid the chaos of multiple tags for the same concept. I now believe that was wrong, at least for notes.

Any changes in tag names will simply reflect the evolving patterns of thought. So long as notes have links to other notes, there is always a route to older tags.This saves time on input and would systemically work rather like Zettelkasten structure notes.
Without the need to make them.

583

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 07:02 AM »

*[] Read all the Andy Matuschak references from Panzer
*[] Work out sequence for evaluating text editors
*[] Check out Typora, Obsidian,  Texts, HackMD and CodiMD

So how long before BBCode goes markdown? Or rather forums simply switch to markdown.

584

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 05:00 AM »

@wraith808, thanks. Are you using hackmd? Looks nice.

-Nod5 (May 27, 2020, 02:36 PM)

Yes, quite a bit.  So much so that I pay for it.  I'm writing my book in it (it has a book type layout), and I thought reading this thread the autolinking feature would be nice for this system.

-wraith808 (May 27, 2020, 04:54 PM)

I'll try this one out too, again within the limits of my PC time. I'll look at Texts too.

585

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 04:57 AM »

Obsidian is a powerful knowledge base that works on top of a local folder of plain text Markdown files:
https://obsidian.md/

-panzer (May 27, 2020, 01:36 PM)

This looks very interesting. I'll give it a go. When I can find time on a PC, since it doesn't seem to have an Android app.

586

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 04:53 AM »

So I am still struggling with one-note one-thought.  Specifically, what i think is one note ends up being a whole  bunch of thoughts. 

-superboyac (November 27, 2019, 02:03 PM)

I'd recommend reading this set of links from Panzer. I've not read all of them yet,  but will. I've never read anyone whose thinking (so far) aligns so well with my own. I'm hopeful I'll find a useful addition to my own practice and, if not, it will be a nice ego boost.
Like me, he seems to be respectful of the way he believes Luhmann worked but sceptical of the the methods of his modern acolytes.
To paraphrase something I think you intimated earlier, the thinking is the actual goal, not the physical note.

I'll also point out that these are actual examples of notes.

Zettelkasten-like system used by Andy Matuschak:
https://notes.andyma...3ViqN3hh3SmrKzjQxWAr

https://notes.andyma...A1kDd46whJh2Gt5rAmfX

https://notes.andyma...SEBzTQiCVGoC4GfK3rYW

https://notes.andyma...FPTZSK3UmdsGExLRfZz1

https://notes.andyma...rQNKr6u7AZ1jFzfTVbMF

-panzer (May 27, 2020, 07:47 AM)

ED: I've now read his note on why books don't work. I sort of agree with much of it, but his understanding of the underlying science is over simple and he's looking out of his car to where he's going rather than taking time to see all the ideas on both sides.
So no longer completely aligned.
 

587

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 28, 2020, 03:47 AM »

Which is a shame, as I would agree that such a feature would be good for acceptance of either MarkDown or AsciiDoc as somewhat of a replacement of WordPad in Windows. Perhaps even Word itself.

-Shades (May 27, 2020, 12:44 AM)

I think that's where the market will be and developers will always chase the market in the end. The major requirement is that there has to be a reasonably simple way of printing or publishing. The world hasn't gone completely digital. I still have clients who require hard copy and I suspect that many recent converts have been mostly motivated to avoid the snail and expect to print internally.

588

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 27, 2020, 09:07 AM »

Zettelkasten-like system used by Andy Matuschak:
https://notes.andyma...3ViqN3hh3SmrKzjQxWAr

-panzer (May 27, 2020, 07:47 AM)

Thank you
Seems like a good day for having prejudices confirmed 

Maybe I should stop reading now

589

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 27, 2020, 08:14 AM »

From an Ultraedit blog :

Markdown is a plain text formatting syntax aimed at making writing for the internet easier.

That fits with the way I see it, and there it succeeds. I'd use it for that myself with no qualms.

590

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 27, 2020, 02:00 AM »

I'm not sure about document structuring.  What I do see is that the cursor position on the preview would have to be fed back to the hidden markdown document.  The commands and text would always only work on the markdown document. I  don't see why it couldn't work in theory but I doubt there's enough processing power on most Android machines to do it in real time. There's already a noticeable lag in preview update and adding the fro to the to would kill it.

Very nice to hear that there are other people with the same wish because it feels totally against this bit of the zeitgeist.

591

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 27, 2020, 12:30 AM »

might be OK if I use text files and turn line numbers

-Dormouse (May 27, 2020, 12:19 AM)

OK so long as I use no commands, even italics. Using them seems to switch it to commonmark mode even if it later saves the file as txt. Makes sense as txt doesn't support italics so it does leave me looking ideally for an editable 'preview' mode.

592

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 27, 2020, 12:19 AM »

AsciiDoc

-Shades (May 26, 2020, 08:22 PM)

Mentioning this has done me a great service. Used it as a search term on Google Play. No Asciidoc but new choices in Markdown editors. Commonmark. Seems to be far more configurable than the others.

I'm not sure I'd use it for writing,  though it might be OK if I use text files and turn line numbers off, but I'm hoping it will work well for formatting text files.

Has preview + edit and edit panel options. Someone suggested adding preview alone. I'm tempted to suggest making preview editable,  which would solve most of my issues. It's the only app I've seen which looks set up to do that because it has six symbol banks for commands,  four of which are purely down to individual choice.  And up to 30 symbols on each.

593

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 07:48 PM »

Personally,  I just write text. Bits of formatting added later. If needed... I don't care about document formats at this point and txt is fine.

-Dormouse (May 26, 2020, 05:05 PM)

Actually, I momentarily forgot the complete truth. I sometimes use italics and prefer to write them as I first type.

And, for some types of writing seeing and using markdown isn't a handicap.  Small part of what I'm doing at the moment though.

594

General Software Discussion / Text Editors

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 07:24 PM »

I've been thinking about text editors for programmers and comparing them with the equivalent for writers . And practicing typing by using a pen for writing on my tablet .

As a class, text editors seem stable, feature rich and highly functional; and there's a lot of them for all devices. Nothing similar for writers.

Having been thinking about Android and markdown, I'm moving on tothinking about the editing stage. I can't see anything on Android that would do. And, having thought about it, none of the Windows options I've ever used do what I'd ideally like either. I could design my own app but no feasible way of doing it myself and no obvious market : I read a piece today saying that all text editors were for programmers because editors for writers was such a tiny niche. Low level editing isn't a problem - plenty of options for that. It's the more individual, structured stuff I'm interested in. So I naturally wondered about trying an actual text editor. Search, find, long documents not a problem. Ditto splits, folds, compare, versions, simple stats. I assume that I can scrub the coloured language syntax, and I've seen at least one saying that it would be easy to set up my own scheme for text files.

Just wondering at this stage. I'm not up for long testing because I need to limit the time I spend on a PC. Thought I might look at Editpad Pro and Ultra Edit. Nothing I've seen is an obvious fit, but neither is anything else. I'd like a sophisticated bookmark system, comments and notes essential.

I'm assuming they'd be useless for markdown files because they'd insist on showing the markdown when I'd only want the text.

595

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 05:49 PM »

Ought to be clear that my main issue isn't with markdown as a file format  - though the lack of a truly accepted standard is an issue on its own  - but about the user interface usually presented. I do want WYSIWYG and often I'd prefer to accept a formatting choice rather than typing it. Depends on what I'm doing. I always need to focus on content and words.

From that point of view,  I hope the apps develop and improve rather than being part of a movement to change the way many users prefer to work.

596

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 05:09 PM »

Writing for the web is different. Fewer words, faster speed. And adding a bit of markdown can save faffing around later.

597

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 05:05 PM »

And possibly the key fallacy - Markdown is NOT readable.
It is decipherable but not readable.
Maybe it's different for programmers who are used to reading instructions mixed with content,  but for most people it's not readable even they have learned the instructions.
It would be easy to do a little experiment.
A markdown file with a few a variety of text formats and a few headings. And 3 nouns formatted red and a different 3 formatted green.
Take twenty subjects who have learned markdown: give half the markdown version and half the published version. Compare reading speeds. The next day ask them all to recall the red words and then the green.
I'm sure that the difference in reading speeds will be substantial and that those seeing the words in colour will have a much greater recall.

The implication is that formatting instructions mixed with text impair both reading and processing. I accept programmers may be immune.
Most writers have periods of reading what they have written interspersed with periods of writing. My case is that Markdown interferes with that.

Personally,  I just write text. Bits of formatting added later. If needed. Accepting Hemingway's maxim that writing should be separate from editing, if not the need to be drunk half the time. I don't care about document formats at this point and txt is fine. And text is what I want to look at,  not markdown instructions.

My need for WYSIWYG is during editing,  not writing. Then I need colour. And other things.  And I need to actually see it, not just have it identified.

598

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 04:27 PM »

Now for some of the evangelised fallacies. I read a tale of how txt is permanent but complex document formats aren't because ability to read them is lost over time. All his wordstar documents gone.
In reality,  I doubt he could still access his five and a quarter floppies, txt or not. Conveniently forgetting there's more than one encoding of txt.
And I bet I can find a way of converting his wordstar files,  whichever version they were.
And explaining that Markdown was simply txt and would always  be accessible.
Mmm.
I can imagine an Eureka moment in fifty years time when the Markdown archaeologist finally cracks an intractable file - "Ha, it's a Github flavour,  with the Joplin variations and additions! "

599

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 04:12 PM »

WYSIWYG was much-loved but not so easy to achieve. Home users loved it, using mice and GUIs.

-Dormouse (May 26, 2020, 01:49 PM)

... but programmers not so much. Possibly because they knew what it might hide. And they were keyboard warriors with masses of memorised shortcuts. Which saved them time as their hands never needed to leave the keyboard. Most journos too; early newspaper systems weren't great at GUI.

But that was never me. Despite using a typewriter since I was a child and teaching myself to touch type on one in my teens. Despite being a very fast typist. Most of the time my hands weren't near the keyboard and I was looking at the screen and thinking. When I was on the keyboard,  I was typing words.

But preferably not using a word processor. I've always avoided those for actual writing as much as I can. Nothing to help me as a writer,  many irritations interrupting my thinking. Liked outliners from the beginning because they gave a bit of organisation, faster access to my writing and irritated less.

The majority of people learned to use word processors at school and that's what was made available when they went to work. With  GUIs.
But programmers had their text editors,  keyboard shortcuts and numbered lines to help them navigate. And using them meant being used to working with syntax mixed visually with content.

And for my style of editing the mouse is faster than the keyboard.

600

General Software Discussion / Re: I'm thinking of going primitive, with discursion into zettelkasten

« Last post by Dormouse on May 26, 2020, 03:42 PM »

Zettelkasten + LaTeX + VS Code = Productivity++ ?:
https://levelup.gitc...ctivity-a7deb650608e

-panzer (May 26, 2020, 01:43 PM)

That was an interesting read.
Who knows if it will prove a productive approach? Seems to me there's a lot of automating and not so much thinking, with multiple break points in the system. And he recommended zettlr for those who liked markdown.

And I noticed the next post down was 'How to be a keyboard warrior' - which brings me neatly to my next point: