Here’s an idea for a cheap alternative to expensive ‘distraction-free’ word processors like the Freewrite (much as I love the idea of the Freewrite – I just cannot afford one.)
A Linux-based OS on a USB stick that boots straight into a very simple RTF-format word processor with on-screen word count, auto-save of timestamped versions of the document to local storage (USB or hard drive) with the option to configure some kinds of cloud storage such as Google Drive, Dropbox, old fashioned FTP, maybe even email etc. Possibly a spell-check included, but not essential. Perhaps allow multiple docs open in tabs so you can have a notes document open to refer to when writing.
The backup / storage options would be configurable from a GUI in the word processor. No other apps would be visible except perhaps include a text-only Wikipedia and online dictionary search.
If this OS booted from USB you could put any old laptop into ‘distraction-free’ mode and it could bring new life to old netbooks and laptops if you installed it on the machine itself.
I know Linux distraction-free word processors are already available, but last time I looked none was quite right: didn’t autosave in RTF format, didn’t have on-screen word count etc. Perhaps that’s changed?
I had a go at writing a very simple word processor ages ago using guizero, perhaps this could be a starting point?
Just found this on my desktop from ages ago and forgotten about… noodling around with a *very* simple word processor made in Python / GUIZero and a half-decent word count (better than some…) pic.twitter.com/K0OXfatNcq
— Giles Booth (@blogmywiki) June 4, 2019
As for making a live Linux USB stick with only one app, I have no idea how to do this, but who’s in?
Hi Giles, did you make the distraction-free writing OS?
I did not. Beyond my abilities at the moment, but would be very interested if anyone does do something like this.
Check this out! https://www.hackster.io/news/featherquill-is-a-dedicated-word-processor-built-on-a-raspberry-pi-98d7b331a0e9
Could fit the bill quite nicely!
I have almost this exact Idea right now and decide to google it just to see if anyone have already come up with it.
I would like one but more focus on coding instead of writing. :/ no luck… off i go to the Google results page but I found your GUIZERO extremely interesting lol one of the reason i gave up on python to js was I find its frustrating to know so much coding before I can just display some stuff via GUI lol