Equipment for the serious writer, and not so serious, too.

[KillerMuffin]

Okay, so what do we all normally run with?

The basic necessities for me are:

Pencils
Index cards
A plethora of half used notebooks
A filebox of assorted reciepts, napkins, burger wrappers, errata that have ideas jotted on them. The "non-traditional" paper file.
I'm ashamed to admit I'm hooked by the fingers to my computer. I need to have it. Word Perfect preferably, but even notepad will do in a pinch.
The laptop. We are a mobile family and with headphones I can tune them out.
Dictionaries
An Encyclopedia of some sort. I call mine the "Internet."

What I want:

A hand held with a portable keyboard. Why? I not only type faster than I write, I type legibly and I don't leave words and whole phrases out making an indecipherable mess.

Any suggestions for those of use who like to run up files of about 50k before moving it to the main puter?

 

[KillerMuffin]

I forgot to mention, for those of us who stay hooked up to the 'Net too much, the google bar has been indespensible. I normally have the music program running, the word processor running, and literotica running. Whenever I get to a pause and reflect spot I peruse the boards. At the top is the google bar. Sometimes I need info. I just type in up to ten words, hit search web, and bammo, instant google find without having to change the page. Saves time. Of course, I have cable now so it's like a whole 30 seconds, but to those of us who type fast, that's a savings of like 50+ words there. If you run a dial up, then that's almost a minute, right? That's a whole paragraph.

I've lost it, haven't I?

 

[christo]

I do a lot of my writing by hand, believe it or not, so I need lots and lots of college ruled notebook paper and two or three Parker Rollerball pens. I always clutch up when I write at the keyboard, but feeling the pen scrape across the page frees up my brain. I love the Rollerballs, the ink looks nice and wet as you write. For awhile I wrote with a Parker Fountain Pen, but I write so fast and so sloppily that the nib didn't keep contact with the page and my writing was totally indecipherable, even by me.

Last year I bought a nice leather binder and I keep all sorts of stuff in there. Stuff I'm working on, stuff I'm editing, research info, inspirational articles. That binder is among my most prized possesions. Makes me feel like a writer.

I have a laptop which I lug around creation. I have IBM's ViaVoice software, a Christmas gift from a few years ago, and it works pretty well, but it crashed my computer last year and I haven't reinstalled it yet. It was nice to just read the stuff I wrote longhand instead of retyping it, which can be a drag. Have to get that program up and running again.

 

[Guest]

I love tape recorders!

I used to do the same thing KM....writing notes and ideas down on everything with a surface. (Still do a little bit), but hauling someones table home so I can do a trace off it to see what I wrote down got a little cumbersome.

I now have an easy access tape recorder that I carry with me mainly when I'm driving, as thats when I tend to write alot of my stories. So if a thought or an idea pops into my head. (May not even be related to the story I'm working on or thinking about) I can run through it, a few times even on the recorder.

Just a thought.........

To sleep......perchance to dream - William Shakespear

I remain......

 

[Ravenswing]

Of mobile computing and writing...

My current writing tools consist of a laptop running Word 2002 and my Dictionary/Encyclopedia hereafter referred to as 'The Internet'.

However, my files actually get stored on a CompactFlash card loaded into my iPAQ's dual expansion jacket and, come next month, when I upgrade the iPAQ's operating system, I'll have a spell checker in Pocket Word so I should be able to do most of my work on the iPAQ with the folding keyboard I've got for it.

Totally portable erotica! Yah!

Mind you, I'll probably still run the text through Word before submission because it picks up grammar mistakes I miss. (Mind you, it can get irritating. Fragment (no suggestions). Arrrrgggh!)

 

[Ravenswing]

Oh yeah, a PS. If you do get a handheld (computer, that is) you can subscribe to Literotica's AvantGo channel and then have new erotica delivered to your pocket browser every day.

The wonders of modern technology are boundless.

 

[English-Passion]

I use a Palm Pilot when I'm out and about. It is great! By using SmartDoc I don't have to worry about the Palm's silly little file size limit either.

My Word 2000 has a neat little add on (I have no idea what it is called now) that I downloaded free from a freeware site that converts Word files into Palm docs and vice versa. That is so useful.

I also write in TextPad on my desktop when I am writing articles (yes, I do real writing too) because sometimes it is too annoying to have to fight through Word's unmitigated helpfulness. TextPad gives you absolutely plain vanilla text files.

When I'm out and working, I always have my laptop with me and all my stories in progress and poem ideas are laplinked between that and my desktop so I am always able to work on the latest version.

There is nothing so annoying as finding that you just did an hours revision on a story that is three versions old.

Finally, I always have a tiny notebook in my inside pocket so I can jot down notes when the muse attacks. Trouble is, as I use computers so often, my handwriting has deteriorated to a level that would even make a doctor squint. Half of what I write is usually illegible. No doubt those indecipherable bits are the ones that show real genius.

A while ago I bought a great voice recognition program and spent ages training it to understand my dulcet tones. It did great. I had a very pleasant hour or two speaking a hot steamy story into my computer. It even understood the rude words - although the occasional 'ooh' and 'aah' floored it.

Then I read it back. It was laughable! Stilted, amateur and utterly unreadable. Certainly any eroticism that I believed it to have disappeared somewhere in the translation.

Either that says a lot about me as an oral storyteller, or it shows that my fingers are better at sex than my tongue. Mrs EP might agree.

English-Passion

 

[JUDO]

Keys

Everything is at the keys, KM, but for one.

I have this huge four foot by eight foot push-pin board on the wall. It's where I do all of my story development refinery. [Built it. Home Depot. About $60 bucks including the nice frame].

I write or print out cards that are the beats or sequences of the story (about twenty five or so of these).

Then I filter them. What's the emotional level of every beat? (heck, my protagonist is depressed for three beats in a row, better change that) What's funny? (Don't forget the funny.) What's cool (that should be in this kind of a story? For example, space stories better have rocketships, aliens, narrow escapes, some kind of technical issue to interllectualize and unknown planets).

Once the sequence of beats has made it past filtering, it's ready for primetime and writing.

The big board sits there quiety, telling me what's next.

Once-in-a-while, if I am somewhere, not at home and I get a worthy idea, I call myself and leave a message.

 

[mlyn]

I feel really stupid

Duh! It is true- we don't read before we start. I had been putting my name in the first line... ok... it is really stupid. It's late...

KM- check out Ebay. I got a handheld pc for 200 bucks, that was normally 500. And when I wanted a newer one, I got a smaller one, with voice recorder, word, extended memory, etc, worth 1200 for 600. All are great! Especially for typing in my lounge chair, with my feet up!

Good luck, mlyn