The write space

I have a lovely seat by the window overlooking the most beautiful city in the world. Everything about this space is traditional of course. For starters, there's a table. 

Then the clutter on top: 

- The iMac

- a bendy soft click keyboard (they tell me it's ergonomic)

- a green cutting mat (the ones arty people use to cut things on) on which the magic mouse grazes

- the magic mouse

- the customary heap of paper

- miniature notebooks for show

- boxes shaped into recognisable storage utensils (pencil tin, document trays) which currently houses the overflow of life. Receipts, coins, hair ties, business cards, miscellaneous bits of junk mail jammed into them. 

Exhibit A:

It's the type of set up that is comfortable when I'm there. In the evenings. Where I spend hours feverishly tapping midnight epiphanies into word documents. Evenings are the prime times for this - for some reason, I'm most creative when I'm supposed to be sleeping. And the set up (see Exhibit A) renders me blind in the glaring daytime sun. I have sat there with sunnies on. Yes, and then felt ridiculous. 

Eon's ago, I made a decision to buy a desk top computer that had some grunt, looked rather pretty and took up the least amount of space. Mobility, I thought, would easily be conquered by my little eeePC. 

I have since booted up my eeePC twice. It's tiny screen, humble processor, clunky operating system, and the 3-pronged electric lifeline I had to lug around made it a very unattractive option. Laptops (whatever size) are also perpetually attached to their keyboards - which makes it very difficult to type, say, lying down.  

Enter the iPad 2. 

Surprisingly, writers have a special interest in this slick device. Writing software is beginning to proliferate - and I am very very glad I didn't jump onto the bandwagon months ago - because it's development life cycle hasn't peaked. 

Parting with a $9 to $18 purchase on productivity applications seems rather steep (relatively speaking for iPad apps but a steal against 3-digit figures on the computer). None of which though, are receiving raving reviews. There are of course a splattering of converts who now swear by the app, but the majority are highlighting flaws from nice-to-haves to would-you-believe-they-forgot-that? 

The players I've noticed so far:

(note: itunes links provided) 

Chapters by Steven Romej

Manuscript by Black Mana Studios

My Writing Spot (aka My Writing Nook) by PT Software Solutions

Novel Writer by Ossidian

Pages by Apple

QuickOffice Connect Mobile Suite for iPad by Quickoffice, Inc.

Short of buying all of them to try out - I've been reading the list of gripes users have had with them. Common complaints: 

- Issues integrating with Microsoft Word

- Complex workflow to transfer docs

- No word count utility

- Font, paragraph, layout limitations

- File type output (txt, rtf, pdf etc)

Some nifty features though, are that they offer baby-functions available on the very serious writing apps like Scrivener, PageFour etc. Notably, Manuscript can story board, and presents a clean solution to sorting out story chapters. 

I am a simple writeling and too much structure scares me a little bit. A distraction free screen, pretty fonts, and smooth convert to MS Word are key to me. But every writer is different. 

In the end, I settled on Pages which resembles Word the closest and does a pretty good job of keeping the formats in tact. Frequently used keyboard short-cuts are also maintained, and Pages has no issues recognising Table of Contents, headers and footers. Economically, Pages is also useful for my other full time job. I am however, very very tempted to invest $8.99 on Manuscript for the sake of checking it out. 

I should also mention some writery apps for side planning and research Dictionary.com, Wikipanion, Kindle, Evernote, SketchBookX. All free must haves.

So my work station has changed somewhat. I am delighted by the lightweight, ultra portable solution which gives me at least 10 hours of working life before a recharge. I prefer using a blue tooth keyboard to thunder along 10,000 words, and I can position the screen wherever I want. Although it needs to be within an arm's length. I'm still unconsciously reaching for the mouse every now and then. 

Here's to a good night's work - 

Exhibit B: