iA Writer encroaching on Drafts territory

Software
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You’re gonna have to pry Drafts out of my cold dead hands (I use cmd-shift2 to pop up the quick capture window on macOS all the time).

But with the 7.1 release of iA Writer three months ago, it looks like it’s becoming capable of doing some (though by no means all) of the things Drafts has pioneered, but without the database storage:

7.1

  • Major upgrade for iA Writer’s integration with Shortcuts
  • 18 new actions to open, create, edit, and organize files
  • This feature requires macOS 13 Ventura
    -We’ve prepared a few practical shortcuts to show what’s possible, and to inspire you to create your own

Open

  • Open New: Opens a new note, ready to be saved to your Inbox folder as soon as you type.
  • Add Diary Entry: Adds an entry to your Diary folder with the current date and time.
  • Take Meeting Notes: Creates meeting notes document for your upcoming calendar event.
  • Open Clipboard: Opens a new file with clipboard contents converted to Markdown.

Save

  • Dictate Text: Saves dictated text to your Inbox folder.
  • Dictate To-Do: Saves dictated text to your To-Do file.
  • Read Later: Saves a web article to your Read Later folder.
  • Shazam: Shazam a song and save it to your Inbox folder.

Current File

  • Listen: Turns current file into audio.
  • Copy Link: Copies a link that can be used to open current file from other apps.
  • Translate: Translates a copy of the current file.

Organize

  • Duplicate Template: Duplicates a template file or folder and adds it to favorites.
  • Search: Opens Quick Search with the provided query.

Edit With ChatGPT

  • Writing Assistant: Use ChatGPT as a conversation partner to improve your text.

Other Improvements

  • Added top author percentage to stats
  • Adjusted insert date actions to use system language
4 Likes
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Definitely interesting.

I feel the same about IA Writer as you do about Drafts but with my Drafts subscription coming up next month, I’ve come to the realisation that I don’t (never?) really use it to its fullest.

It has mainly become my go to for “ideas” that I dictate into my watch and then go through on the iPad later on in the evening.

Not sure IA has a watch app though, so I might still be a little short from being able to get rid of Drafts all together

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Drafts is incredibly powerful and versatile, and there’s still no other app like it. I certainly don’t use it to its fullest, but I’m very happy with what it does for me.

I’d use iA Writer a lot more if it had a simple option to fade the markdown characters a bit to a lighter shade. It’s fine for writing paragraphed text, but I can’t stand using it for anything with a lot of formatting.

I’ve tried to get used to it but I just can’t. It’s too bad, because it’s the only thing keeping it from being my favorite general-purpose markdown editor, especially for fast writing.

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A related question is how the new shortcuts work when triggered via the watch… which is not too well:

Sorry, something went wrong. Shortcuts says, “Sorry, you can’t do that here. Try it on your iPhone instead.”

It’s not hard to come up with workarounds for this, of course. But yes, it’s not the full-bore dictatorial workflow Drafts’s Watch app supports.

1 Like