I think I’ve finally got a blogging setup that I love on a mac. I’ve tried using blogging tools like Marsedit and Ecto, but they did too much of what I didn’t need and not enough of what I did need.
What I Want:
- A simple text editor to FOCUS on writing… I want a full screen text editor to black out everything but the page I’m writing on. And I want that page to be more of a narrow column, like a blog (500-700px wide).
- I want to be able to edit the typography… because if I don’t write in Georgia with some decent line height, I won’t take myself seriously!
- I want to write in textile or markdown so its easy to read, and yet i’m coding as I go (e.g., links, headlines, bold, etc.)
- I just need to export from textile/markdown to copy and paste the HTML directly into WordPress. And i want to do this with the fewest number of round-trips between apps.
- from there, i don’t need to keep around the Mac version of the post… The WP is the only master copy I need.
And the solution is: Scrivener!
I LOVE me some Scrivener. Scrivener is the only writing app you need. It’s awesome. It does the full-screen writing mode like a star. In fact, i didn’t know I wanted that till I used Scrivener.
Seriously, that’s a big deal to me. Scrivener was made to be written in… It clears your desk, forcing you into the brutality of the white page (the color of which can be customized, of course).
In Scrivener you can also break down your document into several smaller documents within a draft. When you export, Scrivener will put them all together for you, adding page breaks and titles (if you want).
It also is a great tool to keep everything organized within one single scrivener file (research, images, etc). But it is a whole lot of tool… and easy to fiddle with, so be careful you’re not just wasting a shuck-ton of time on “customizing”your “workflow.”
Scrivener exports from Markdown to HTML!
I just recently realized this: in Scrivener you can write your post and click File > Compile Draft, and from there choose “Export as MultiMarkdown to HTML.”So, that means Scrivener is the ONLY tool I need to blog, from start to finish!
Truth is, I’ve been using Scrivener for about a year now, and I just now figured this out! lol!
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What a great idea. I’ve been loving using Scrivener for writing longer projects, but never thought of using it for blogging. Definitely going to give this a try!
I am a devote Blogo user. I will try Scrivener though.
Does anyone know if the Windows beta can do all this?
Hi Karen, I don’t think there’s any way to put scrivener on your windows machine. Sorry :(
Actually, Scrivener does now have a windows version of their software. I highly recommend Scrivener to anyone. Here is the link to the site for the software: http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivenerforwindows/
Oh wow, thx Dianna! I had no idea!
hello, sorry if i am naive, i am just getting started in blogging … so far i’ve just been writing in whatever (textpad or word or even right in my blog post in private draft mode) and then hitting publish. i am looking at scrivener as a great blogging tool, but i seem to be missing a piece of the story … can you tell me why the need for the intermediate step(s) of 1. scrivener (write) –> 2. convert to PLAIN TEXT? OR HTML??? –> 3. Insert into blog post? What is the purpose of step 2 (plain text and/or HTML?) — why not just copy text from scrivener into blog post and format with the blog post GUI? I’m sure there’s a good reason, i just need to understand! thanks! 8) Is header/bold/italics/links formatting from Scrivener portable to wordpress? thanks for your help!
Oh, as an addendum … I have tried very hard to avoid needing to learn HTML, so I don’t really know any … I always look to use a GUI or shortcut of some kind…But I want to figure out the most efficient way to use scrivener as a blogger. Is it now possible to do that without that middle step? thanks again jessa
Hi Jessa, the main reason I use something like Scrivener or Textmate is to write in a format called Markdown (more on that) and save my work on my local computer.
From markdown I can export HTML which I place directly into Wordpress’ html editor.
It sounds like you don’t need this step at all, you could just write in Scrivener, copy and paste that content into the Wordpress visual editor and I think that’d preserve all your bold and italic formatting. Should do the trick for you.
Hi Chase! I have a question for you. How do you set up your scrivener typography to better match what you’ll want to export for html? Any tips or tricks for Scrivener preferences, etc? I love using Scrivener for writing, but I don’t like how it sets up text when I’m writing out ideas for blogging.
Rob, I’m not sure how you mean. All of the typography and style can be customized in Scrivener’s preferences. When I export to HTML I’m only grabbing the raw HTML of the writing (no css styling, etc) — that way I can paste the HTML directly into a blog post to inherit the styles from the site’s CSS and styles.
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