

TypWrittr – Inspirational, Minimalistic, Distraction-free Text editor - O_W_Grant
http://www.typwrittr.com

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paulojreis
Distraction-free and minimalistic, with background photography? I mean... not
even the text area has a solid background, as it blends with the photography!
It's noisy as hell, quite the opposite of what you are selling.

I'm sorry for the criticism, and I do support the initiative, but please try
to align your product with your conceptual premises. Validate it, empirically.
You claim it to be distraction-free? Try to get some metrics and subjective
reviews, test with users. Also, you _can_ stand on the shoulder of giants.
There's literature about attention, even about typing.

~~~
O_W_Grant
backgrounds do not distract, at least me, but they do help to dive deeply into
story, you just have to find one. And in case you really want to have a blank
white paper with black ink - just set it via preferences.

~~~
paulojreis
I'm sorry, but the background (behind the text) is essentially noise. It will
impact your reading which will, of course, impact typing.

And about the "at least me" argument... I'm all for personal inspiration and
taste in personal projects, and applaud you for following what you like. But
you're trying to provide distraction-free writing for _others_ , so you have
to consider their characteristics, you have to consider what science knows
about attention, reading and typing - not your taste.

I've noticed that you replied elsewhere that your typographic choice was also
motivated by personal taste. Both noisy backgrounds and typography will deeply
impact how your product performs in providing distraction-free writing. I
think you can balance your personal _touch_ with improvements in the
fundamental dimensions of your product.

~~~
O_W_Grant
that is why there's a variety of customization options present - feel free to
customize it as you wish. Also, there are two "blank" inspirational presets
already build in, much inspired by blank black old terminals.

~~~
nacs
Why not stick to your tagline and make it blank/minimal by _default_ and allow
people to add silly backgrounds like trees if they really want it?

~~~
O_W_Grant
because there are tonns of 'minimal/blank' projects exists already, why create
another one? )

~~~
nacs
Your own title says it's yet another "minimalistic" one. Maybe you should
answer your own question then.

~~~
O_W_Grant
if there's one word in common, it doesn't mean projects will all be the same.

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yoanizer
To be honest I never really understood this need for minimalistic text
editors. I can understand if all you know is MS Word, but when I need
distraction free editing, I just launch Vim, open a file in my dropbox, and
switch to full screen, done. No need for 10,000 projects like this
(FocusWriter, WriteMonkey, WriteRoom, and whatever else).

(and as everyone else already mentioned, don't start by asking people their
email).

~~~
andrey-p
I found my favourite writing environment (IWE?) to be Vim + Goyo [1] + line-
wrapping with j/k keys mapped to gj/gk [2]

[1]:
[https://github.com/junegunn/goyo.vim](https://github.com/junegunn/goyo.vim)

[2]:
[http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Move_cursor_by_display_lines_when_...](http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Move_cursor_by_display_lines_when_wrapping)

~~~
yoanizer
+1 for Goyo.

As a side note, I don't like line-wrapping too much, I prefer auto formatting
(:set tw=80 and then type away, vim will handle the line breaks)

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seqizz
Oh sweets, needs sign-in.. _ctrl-w_

~~~
zackhall
Agreed - nothing more annoying than a product that wants my credentials before
I can even try it out, see a screenshot, or anything else that might make me
want it. _le sigh_

~~~
O_W_Grant
noted, will surely add some screenshots!

~~~
atmosx
add an guest account, something we can experiment with? :)

it's sweet for chromebooks...

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O_W_Grant
A fresh spin in online book writing. typWrittr is designed to be as
minimalistic as possible, but features high customizability, cloud storage and
"Inspirational presets". Feels like you've been teleported into story with
your good old typewriter.

~~~
shrikant
A couple of questions:

1\. Was it a conscious choice to only offer up monospaced fonts?

2\. I can't find a way to close the "cabinet" after I open it to access my
list of notes: is this a bug, or am I missing something obvious?

3\. Any change you have the source code up somewhere?

Thanks btw, looks nice!

~~~
O_W_Grant
1\. yes, monospaced fonts reminds me ones on typewriters. 2\. just press the
same button that opens cabinet. 3\. in public repo - no (

~~~
marcoms
Are the mono font's hard-coded? i.e. font-family: "custom font" vs. font-
family: "monospace"

~~~
O_W_Grant
they are preloaded on demand. Cannot reply more, but I get your point. No,
fonts are used only that are defined by me, but I your idea of using system-
defined monospace font sound as 'feature to add' to me =)

~~~
marcoms
right, but does it use the default monospace fonts set by the user or do you
set your own?

For example, my default monospace font is Source Code Pro - will it use my
font or your own (if any)

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hliyan
Interesting. I would actually consider something like this for my current
writing project, provided there is:

1\. Some means of account recovery. I didn't notice a forgot password link.

2\. Way to bulk import and export files. I will have my own primary storage.

3\. Save the font, color, background and border settings as my own presets

4\. Change the background _without_ changing (3). A graphical writing prompt
for each different scene is useful, but having to change the rest of the
formatting each time is an inconvenience.

5\. Make it HTTPS

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donniezazen
I was thinking aren't all text-editors are minimalistic and distraction free.
I use KWrite and Emacs. Emacs is awesome for text-editing. There is nothing in
my Emacs expect an empty space to write.

~~~
O_W_Grant
They sure are in some way or another. But 'distraction-free', as a term for
editor (and, as well, editor for writers) means ability to go full-screen, so
nothing can distract you (like news in another tab). But having a blank paper
wasn't what I wanted, I wanted distraction-free editor with nice picture on
background, like space nebula when I write scifi novel about space travelling
and galactic battles. TypWrittr is a synergy of it.

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Grue3
Is it intentional that "cloud" is omitted from the submission title? Because I
bet many would've never clicked on it otherwise. I mean, a text editor that
you need to _sign in_ into? How crazy. I'll stick with Emacs.

~~~
O_W_Grant
It's a limit of 80 chars per title (

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jevgeni
Ulysses. Why anything else?

It is:

\- minimalist

\- has cloud storage

\- configurable

\- pleasant to work in

Boom!

~~~
O_W_Grant
ulysses is not free and it's an app, and it seems it's an app for mac only.

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jevgeni
It's true, that it's Mac only.

But, I came to realise, that free isn't without cost. So, I'd invest in a good
tool, if I need to work with it a lot.

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newobj
strlen("Minimalistic") > strlen("Minimalist")

Also,
[http://www.typwrittr.com/screenshots/scr2.png](http://www.typwrittr.com/screenshots/scr2.png)
"And I am _exited_ to share it with you"

~~~
O_W_Grant
minimalistic sounds better a bit.. to me. Screenshots are fixed now, thanks!

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PauloManrique
Great product. Any chance to implement saving files to dropbox?

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O_W_Grant
thanks, Paulo, I will consider it as a feature request, and I will research if
it is possible.

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Darky
@O_W_Grant : where are these backgrounds coming from ?

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joejayanth
exited to share?? excited to share!

~~~
O_W_Grant
fixed that, thank you!

