What kind of Software/Tools do you use?

[Asukaner117]

Didn't find a thread with via search.

So what kind of software do you use when writing a fan fiction? Just good old Word or things like Scrivener? Or do you use voice recognition software? Special tools for a timeline? Or just pen and paper?

Does anyone have experience with OneNote? Started using it just recently, is it any good for managing big stories, timelines or character bios?

[Glor]

Well, for writing in general I just use OpenOffice. It's free and has all the basic stuff you might need for writing purposes. You'll probably have to update its dictionary more than you would with Word, but that's a small price to pay. Word also costs money and comes with a slew of obnoxious options and features that, personally, I just don't need.

Although Word's comment feature makes it really easy to review/edit someone else's work.

I've never heard of Scrivener.

I don't recommend using OneNote for anything longer than a few hundred words. It's helpful if you need to keep certain things separate from your story document, like timelines and bios. That way your main document can be exclusively for the story portion as opposed to you having to scroll through tons of background stuff getting to your story every time you open it.

[zlink64]

I used to use one note and I didn't like it for creative writing because I like to have everything out in front of me at once. I ended up using it to just save web pages with useful information on writing so that I could reference it later; this proved to be useful in hindsight because a lot of writersdigest web pages/articles kinda don't exist anymore on the site.That being said I think nothing beats index cards on a thumbtack board for timelines/plot. You should try it. Chances are you'll never go back. If you don't have a thumbtack board or enough space just use the floor. You can just stare at your story all laid out and think about it and how you wanna change things. You could even add sticky notes to specific index cards if you want to note something specific about the plot point ex like a character development or a reminder or etc/anything really. For all other info like characters and notes I just use pen and paper. And Word for actual writing.

[Gob Hobblin]

Scrivener. I love Scrivener.

It is one of the most versatile writing tools I have ever used.

[Nuclear Lunchbox]

Microsoft word. It's good enough for everything else, so it does the job for fanfiction whenever I bother to write it.

[pwhodges]

Most of mine was written in a text editor (TwistPad, as it happens); but now I use Scrivener, as a result of Gob's pointing me at it. It's not free - but then nor was TwistPad.

[MisterHalt]

OpenOffice. My only complaint with it is that it doesn't check grammar. There's supposedly plugins that do it, but for some reason they require a constant connection and I simply don't trust that.

[Seoul Gamer]

Scrivener. I love Scrivener.

It is one of the most versatile writing tools I have ever used.

I used to use Scrivener as well, but it always messed up my paragraph formatting whenever I tried to export the documents I'd created. For some reason, it would indent the first line, but none of the other lines. Then if I tried to correct that line, everything else all went to hell and I had to go through each and every document, fixing the indentation all over the place.

I don't know, maybe the Mac version just sucks.

I don't use OpenOffice any more either. There's a more modern version called LibreOffice, a fork of OpenOffice, which I use because it's recommended by Fanfiction.net. I haven't had any problems with spell checking on it since you can download language packs for UK English.

Of course, no tool will make up for bad writing, so I've yet to publish anything online. :P

[Clover]

Notepad, then I upgraded to Notepad++, now I'm using OneNote and not even writing fanfiction anymore. Trying to organize any substantial story was a nightmare without OneNote's tabs and text bolding/strikethrough. I didn't care because it was just fanfiction.

I am being paid by Microsoft. Buy a Windows Phone you hacks.

[Reichu]

I currently use a combination of the following:

- Pen & Paper: Hardbound writing journals, specifically. There's a certain creative flow I can achieve on paper that's not yet possible with the computer, plus it's very easy to make diagrams and drawings on the fly.
- LibreOffice: Very functional free equivalent of Word. Would be more useful if it had a tab function, though.
- Windows Speech Recognition: It comes free with Windows and works fairly well, so why not? I only use this for dictating written notes, as it's sufficiently error-prone that trying to dictate to it off the cuff would be disastrous.

[Nuclear Lunchbox]

Microsoft word. Getting free software through school is wonderful~

Plus, I like the software. I understand there are people who much prefer OpenOffice, but I prefer using Word whenever I have to get a lot of stuff onto a page. (OpenOffice is wonderful for anything where you need easy access to non-English characters, though. It was great for making my physics study guides.)

[BlueBasilisk]

I do most of my writing with simple paper and a mechanical pencil, well away from the computer. I can type faster but it's much too easy to get distracted by various things at the computer and it's too easy to edit on the fly. Hard to accomplish much when you keep rewriting the same sentence over and over.


When I transcribe what I've written, I usually use Wordpad or Word when it's available.

[cyharding]

Windows Speech Recognition: It comes free with Windows and works fairly well, so why not? I only use this for dictating written notes, as it's sufficiently error-prone that trying to dictate to it off the cuff would be disastrous.

Really? I didn't know there was something like that in the newer versions. My wpm is around 20-25 wpm, so it would be really useful to me. The only question for me is whether I should get Word or the Libre office version. I don't know much about Scrivener, so I'm unsure about it.

[Reichu]

Really? I didn't know there was something like that in the newer versions.

In my version, you can reach it via Accessories - Ease of Access - Windows Speech Recognition. (Or you can just type "speech recognition" in the Start Menu search bar and hope it comes up.) Do the entire tutorial before anything else.

[pwhodges]

"Real men use Vi" - or Emacs if you're on that side of the fence. (Apologies for the old-school sexism.)

Actually, I've used all the tools mentioned at times, but these days alternate between a plain text editor (TextPad or TwistPad) for quick and dirty writing, or Scrivener when I want to be organised. (I don't use Vi for writing, but I do use it at work occasionally.)

I tried dictation back in the 1990s, but it was slower than typing because of the errors. My only success with it was setting up a computer with voice control for my late father-in-law who had extreme difficulty with a mouse. (Trivia question: what domestic OS came with voice control out of the box in the 1990s?)

[Mr. Tines]

I always first draft with pen(cil) and paper, then refine to disk. I used to use Amaya as an XHTML editor, but these days it's more likely to be Scite as my general purpose text editor of choice, putting format codes in by hand. The down-side is that it's easier to lose track of the original (I put the next chapter of my massive x-over fic on paper some years ago and haven't found the notebook any time I had the opportunity to transcribe and polish.

I tried dictation back in the 1990s, but it was slower than typing because of the errors.

I remember upgrading from a 133Mhz CPU to 200Mhz in the late '90s to support Dragon Dictate for my wife. That was a sufficiently bad experience (it only worked at all reliably for female voices, and then not well, and I could never get it trained) that it has put her off the idea even after a couple of decades of progress.

[Reichu]

I tried dictation back in the 1990s, but it was slower than typing because of the errors.

I guess if you have as much stuff to transcribe as I do, any change of pace is welcome. The errors are obnoxious, but, alternatively, holding my notebooks open and keeping my place is a lot easier when my hands are free.