Stay in the flow : Scrivener and post blogging

This post is about using Scrivener for the redaction of post, and practices to stay in the flow.

  • Before, I was writing directly in WordPress, in markdown, or offline in some markdown editor.
  • Now I do the design and the edition in scrivener. Then export to Markdown, and push it to WordPress .

I will describe :

  • the benefits I feel using this approach,
  • the alternatives I used before,
  • and where I feel there is still some frictions.

After a quick view on the setup.

The Setup

Here is the core setup I use . Corkboard on the left, Text on the right ( Scrivenings). I used the Quick reference to type the text of one card.

splitscreen
This setup is used during the writing phase. During the design phase, I use the corkboard full screen.

Tip: Vertical Split Screen

Tip: I used Quick reference to type the text, (by dropping the cards on the button in the bar). So I do not have to seek where is the place of a card in the scrivenings.

Example of use

Mini refactoring

Here is the example of a mini refactoring. Here, I realize discussing alternatives is better done later than just in the introduction , and I want to keep the introduction focused. The two cards selected (blue borders) move from the introduction to later on in the text. Just a mouse movement. Easy.

minirefactoring1

minirefactoring2

Major refactoring

Here is the example of a major refactoring. I realised I was telling two stories at the same time, and this would be better for clarity to split in two posts. So I marked the one to split out with a label, and after moved them out. Note how it looks simpler after ! Also imagine how deeply this would have changed the text if this decision would have been taken not at Design phase, but after Redacting… plus the Emotional cost, which would surely have put me off the flow…

majorefactoring1

majorefactoring2

Tip 1: Activated the view / Use label color in index card).

Tip 2: Duplicate a folder before a major refactoring, just in case. Duplication copy the cards and the corkboard position.

Benefits

Do I feel my workflow improved ? Yes . Is it Perfect yet ? No.
Lets see Why.

  • I found the conception / planning of the story vastly improved with corkboard and cards. Writing the essence of an idea on a card and jumping to the next enable my speedy mind to stay in the flow.

Tip : I use cmd-N to get a get card next to the current one, and keep my fingers on the keyboard. (Mousing away side track me, as my eyes move somewhere else, and my attention with it)

  • I found the redacting of the text less frustrating, as I get a sense of focus by using the Quick reference, and a sense of completion/progress by using the status and see the red label progressing across the board . This is especially true when resuming after interuption.

focus

  • The publishing is trivial but not transparent. Compile for Markdown, Open the resulting text file copy and paste into WP (or MarsEdit when offline ). This is not complicated, however it is not transparent enough not to halt the flow. I try not to do it too often. A dropbox copy of the file to the post would be superb.

  • Image: This is not good at all. This stop the flow, fully. The problem is to have not just image, but clickable thumbnail. So images have to be uploaded by the WP interface, and get back the url, by inserting the media in the post, and paste back the url snippet into scrivener. I haven’t found a better solution yet. However, acceptable when managed.

Conclusion

The main objective was to experiment with the corkboard for the conception, as an alternative to mindmapping, or taskpaper, and stay in the flow.
I found it is reached.
I also felt an improvement in productivity and focus, during the redacting.

This experiment was in fact a test case for mode-thinking, during the conception process. I will develop this in a separate post.

More about me

luc_taesch

These days ( 2014) , My main professional interest is about the collective intelligence and cooperative behavior of human, especially in the “professional” field. I believe most of the impact can be done where people spend 8h a day. If you can impact this , you will impact them when they go back in their families, and from there, the “society”.

My previous leverage was about influencing to change individual postures ( towards more freedom) , my current one is about creating the structures so that individual freedom can be expressed. Also , deconstructing the current ones by seeing their impacts, so people can get out of the box by making choices.

I pursued a 30 years personal development path, lastly in cognitive science, system thinking , complexity, NVC, Sociocracy, Holacracy, after having discovered and experienced agile in 99, managed people since 87, and commercialized my first software when I was 16.


My [MBTI profile] is [ENTP]/[ENTJ]/[ENFP] : Visionary / Innovator / Organizer/ Coach (55/45 on the last Two characteristics, 75/25 on the first two )

As a freelancer, I typically sell daily the Organizer or Coach Part of me. This blog is an attempt making some use of the Visionnary / Innovator Part 😉 .

Here is my plain-ified profile on Linkedin, (Plain-ified because you have to pass thru the procurement processes, and too much seniority or variety does not pass the process. )

On a daily, I freelance and typically sell my Coordination, SME, or Technical skills, mainly in Banking ( as Program/ Project Manager / Architect / Change Manager /Business Analyst) . Originally (87 🙂 ) in Market Finance, but these days this means living in London or NY, and My Family is in Belgium. I try and stay relatively hands on, and away of too much Slideware Boards, or power oriented roles. Been there, done that , this is not very helpful ( for me at least).


2013 edition:

I am 48, discovered FP in 2000 by Serendipity, tipped during an OO conference by a respected expert and stakeholder in … Eiffel :-). the Hudak94 paper grabbed my attention , and SOE made me fall off my chair… I [just could not believe it], so I explored it with Erlang and Haskell

At that time (96-01), I was trying to find a patch for project failure, trying to work out way to get control, especially for large project ( large as.. 400 FTE, (part of it Offshore) / 1 Billion Budget). I had already explored the classical avenues of Project Management, Methodologies and Processes, and knew the solutions were not there. Agile & Lean got my attention since 99, as this was close of my intuitive practices earlier on. But how to make this scale ? Also, how to use these practices earlier in the chain, in Requirement and Analysis ?. Could we produce testable requirement ? Could we codify SME ?

Today, I know the Answers are Strong Typing + Abstraction + EDSL . My Next question is: how can we make the world know ? We need a Go To Market Strategy. This is what this blog is about.

Progress 2013 02 02

Progress so Far:

  • First RCA done , and pushed to Alberto for Private review (am I ashamed to share it, btw ? hm.. need for approbation . specialness?)
  • documented the Persona approach and created the seed of a [glossary]

Interrogation raised :

  • a good title for this recurring update ? Journal yymmdd . cant imagine another title every time, sounds like [diversion].
  • the main glossary should be auto done. find a WP tip. backlogged. not urgent. nor important now.
  • cant get the top glossary page, only the leafs.

ProgressKanban20130202

Persona shows their concerns

Lets create a few fictitious Persona, and run a few Root Cause Analysis on their concerns. From these concerns we will derive needs ( and barriers) . Then we aggregate the result from different Personas, and this give us a start to the Haskell Ecosystem, these personas are the actors from the Ecosystem. either as Key Partners, Key Resources or Market Segment( and from this understanding we would derive opportunities, products, and “go to market “strategy).

Current step:

sharedConcerns= mapReduce RCA [Persona] -> Set [Concerns]

What moves me

When preparing the root Cause Analysis at the 1st Person, I realize I was listing feelings in fact, or values, so I did the motivator exercise from Jurgen Appello, i.e. :

  1. classifying your motivation in your personal order, then
  2. perceiving the delta for a given situation ( target would be here is a Haskell job) ( the + /- here below )

interesting findings:

  • mainly gains, no loss
  • if I would map these values to my currents jobs, I am FAR offset… 1 to 3 are barely touched…
  1. goal +++
  2. curiosity ++
  3. freedom +++
  4. mastery ++
  5. honor
  6. power
  7. relatness – (physical isolation) ++ virtual community
  8. status
  9. acceptance
  10. order

[Kanban] Trello is back, BmFiddle is out, and could Haskell do the same (today) ?

when experimenting with BmFiddle 1, I got pissed with D&D being not reliable (enough), at least for the kanban. I am giving Trello 4 another try…

kanban ProgressKanban20130201

Serendipity:

1/ I saw Trello are developing in “public”, and one can vote on it (eat you own dogfood !)… nice mix of Roadmap, and Electronic Democracy (@Alberto )…

trellodevboard

trelloEevBoard

2/ Trello Blog expose their techno Stack 3… can we do this in Haskell today, and how ? more simply I would guess, but I would love some opinions on it … . plus some “readiness”/ maturity assessnesment what is the gap between the vision exposed by and this ?

1 4 2 3

(arrgh: WP-content is messing around with my references… I have to dig out later on it … but later .. lets procrastinate with intelligence.. call it focus if you want;-) 😉

wpcontentandMDref

Async : Concurrency and STM : Simon Marlow at Skills Matter

Haskell eXchange 2012: Simon Marlow on High performance concurrency .

 

I watched the async package, (namely similar  to erlang’s tree of control process) . include exceptions management. great. plus combinators. ; interesting remarks from Simon at the beginning about the not so large number of application available in haskell.

Again a (synchronicity), Just the day I realized the missing product owner role, leading to a lack of publicly available apps in haskell ecosystem. I have to develop this in a post.

(found via linked in)

Back To Life

Resurrecting my blog, that was down after a hack in 2009. Never cared putting it back, as I was not sharing publicly. Now I am back with this Haskell roadmap motivation. Funnily enough, I picked my kanban to test the rotating images ( QuickSlider) on the Land Page, and I realize that may be a good idea to share the way forward, in fact …..may have to manage version, thought;-)

 

kanban

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