Most of this stuff is available on both Mac and Windows. Most of it's not free, but I know you foin upstandin' citizens never resort to shady piratical things, do ya? Most of it is also cross-platform, but where I name something that isn't, I'll try to find a Windows equivalent. Alfred. This app basically lets you search damn near everything and launch every software application you have with just a keyboard combination and entering shorthand (for an app) or the full phrase (for a local machine or web search.) What makes this app useful for writers? The quicker you get to that piece of information you're researching for your story, the better! (Windows equivalent: Launchy. Evernote. Without a doubt the greatest annotation and organization app to date. With mobile clients for damn near every mobile OS out there, "Web Clipper" addons for the most widely-used browsers and desktop clients for Windows and Mac, it's the other half of your research. Use Alfred (or Launchy) to find it, use Evernote to save and organize it. Scrivener. Probably one of the most talked about apps for writers, it's not so much a word processor, not really a project management app, as it is a word project management processor. (I just made that up.) This app is basically the do-everything long-form document creation tool. While Word and Pages deal in single documents -- which can get tedious to navigate through when you're talking 100,000 words of manuscript or 90-110 pages of screenplay -- Scrivener acts as a "binder" of individual but connected and organized documents. To wit: As shown in the screenshot, we see the editor window in the bottom, the "corkboard" in the top showing the individual scenes of the current document being edited, the "binder" on the left displaying the parts and chapters of the project, and the document inspector on the right. Although it all looks complicated, it's actually completely customizable so that you can create the workflow that best suits you. Apparently whoever set up the screenshot is a big fan of kitchen sinks. Windows version also available (though naturally, because Scrivener was begun as a Mac application, the Windows version is perfectly adequate but not quite as far along in development.) What about shorter stuff like blog posts or just writing for the purpose of busting through writer's block? For quick, this-isn't-a-project casual writing, I use Byword. Byword is a spartan little writing app that basically just presents you with a clean space and an insertion point. It does two things you can set and forget, which are syncing through your choice of iCloud or Dropbox, and you can choose to edit in either rich text or Markdown. That's it, the whole shebang. Looks a little something like this: (Looks like that user has it in Markdown mode. I just use Rich Text.) There's also a Byword iOS app, whence cometh the use of synchronization. The nearest equivalent I was able to find (quickly) for Windows is FocusWriter. And just to firmly cement this in the Workshop, here's a poem: There once was a writer named Castle Fit ladies he much loved to wrassle As to writing this poem Well, surely, you know 'im He couldn't be arsed with the hassle.
I just realized something annoying as I was making a mental note to use Scrivener some more: It's on the hard-drive that's trying to commit seppuku on my desktop. (I don't totally blame it -- that box freezes so much the hard drive's sending me a message. Can't afford a Mac yet, Skin)
Roger that. Wrote first drafts in longhand until a short deadline on ms. #13 or so necessitated going straight to screen. And I only - reluctantly - switched to Word after it was drummed into me that "nobody uses Corel anymore." After that, the only battle was getting some old fogey editors to accept electronic submissions...
Oh, I also store a lot of the background and stuff for my projects in my brain, vice externally. Tho sometimes this method has its drawbacks . . .
Notepad. I'll spelling/grammar-check with a buffering through OpenOffice if it's something that has to be shown off to "fancy people".
Oh, yeah. My "favorite" is the thing that flits across your brain at 4 a.m. and that you tell yourself will "still be there when I get up in the morning." As if. Even if you keep a notebook on the night-table to scribble something on in the dark, the next morning it's "WTF is that supposed to mean?" As for work-in-progress, it's in my brain, on my hard drive, on a backup flash drive, and in hard copy (I'll print each chapter as I finish, in what I consider a "middle" draft" for markup), not to mention the "this is where we're going next" on Post-its and scribbled on the edges of crosswords. I've had too much stuff go missing in the past not to have backups for my backups...
*Plays back voice recorder* "Mumble mumble incoherent shit* 'What the fuck was I on last night?! I can't decide if I need more of that shit or to avoid it!'
Almost forgot one -- Final Draft. Can't live without that one. I have a couple others that I make a half-hearted attempt to get into from time to time -- CeltX, Montage, Storyist, whatever -- but Final Draft is where the job gets done. Well, the post-structuring-and-rough-drafting-it-in-Scrivener job, anyway.
I use Celtx when I'm doing something quick and dirty, and it does reasonably well. Final Draft when I'm investing more energy into the project.
I use primo or bullzip. It converts everything into a permanent pdf file which I transfer to my zip drive. That way I don't have to get a two bed apt to store all the paper.
