How to Cancel Ulysses

Those who hate the subscription model need to get over it: there are (apparently) plenty of simple Markdown-centric text editors that will meet your needs. Dinging this app out of sheer bitterness won’t make you feel better, provide useful input to others, or change the need for a sustainable economic model for serious software developers. this app is a serious writing tool for serious writers. It may take some getting used to if you are coming from the world of Word, or similar “word processors,” but if you are more interested in content rather than the formatting, this app will reward you with a clean and powerful writing environment. My own personal experience mirrors that of many others: initial skepticism in the early days growing to familiarity and fondness. this app’ developers are living up to their promise to deliver an increasingly powerful and refined writing environment, with regular and substantive updates. If great apps like Byword or Apple’s Notes meet your level of writing needs, great: simple tools for simple needs. But, if you write a lot, I heartily recommend this app.

Just to put everything in context, I'm mostly a blogger and essayist. For large scale research projects and other tomes, a much more heavy duty tool like Scrivener is the tool of choice. For me, this app allows me to freely write without a lot technological interference, yet it is feature rich and I can still do word processory things if I still want to. I can export my work as an ePub, Docx or a PDF, but what I most appreciate is that I can directly to my WordPress blog without ever leaving this app. this app is also very Apple centric. Thus I have versions installed on my Mac, my iPad and my iPhone. And as this app stores my projects on iCloud sharing between platforms is totally transparent. Since I normally work remotely, I typically start a new blog entry or an essay using an iPad, but if some rare moment of inspiration hits me and I'm out and about somewhere, I can grab my phone, open up this app and not have to loose them fleeting moment. A very valuable plus for me.

I love this app. At this point I almost couldn’t write without it. One recent change I’m especially pleased with is the improved DropBox integration — I’ve had occasional problems with iCloud sync between iOS and Mac OS, but DropBox has worked for me. Having all of my drafts and research and snapshots from the web in one place is great. Also.... I write a lot of short reviews and they’re all right there. Projects that need to be submitted in (say) Word format can easily be exported and tinkered with there, but all the heavy lifting happens in this app. And as a big Markdown fan, I find their Markdown support excellent. So.... yeah. Every time I see a flashy ad and think about switching to something else, I think.... nah.

Okay, I’ve only been using this for 24 hours but holy cow! It is already making my life easier. I have been using a different program to free write in but I was struggling to keep all my versions straight and my outlines and my notes and everything. It was MADDENING!!! But this is so smooth and easy to use! I can quickly move files around under different folders with the flick of a finger. #coulditbeeasier #absolutelynot #lovelovelove It syncs across platforms which is great because if I’m waiting in line and have a quick idea, I can jot it down on my phone. I tend to write on my iPad with a wireless Apple keyboard and the iPad interface is flawless. The subscription is totally worth it! I AM IN LOVE!!!

Editing my previous review (bumping it up to four stars from three)... A couple of weeks ago, I slammed this app for recent iCloud sync issues. Then I did some more research and learned it's not alone in that regard. Indeed, many if not most so-called "shoebox" or central-library apps — like, to name two very familiar examples, Apple's own Notes and Photos apps — are prone to them, too. It seems to be the nature of the beast. If you value having all your work together in the same library at all times without having to futz around with individual files and folders, the risks that go with the "shoebox" method are part of the price of admission. So I withdraw that previous complaint. Indeed, if it were not for that method of file storage and the occasional (but sometimes scary) glitches that accompany it, I'd give this app five stars. For most of my work, I prefer the advantages of MultiMarkdown and a more transparent file structure than what this app offers. That said, I still recommend it highly; it's a great app and a marvelous writing environment in which you'll spend many hours working happily and productively.