5 Useful Tools for Productive Online Writing


Creating content for the web isn’t easy, especially when there are so many tempting distractions. Hence it is important that a web writer is familiar with some tools of the trade that help in enhancing his productivity as a writer.

Following is a list of 5 tools which I think should be present in every writer’s toolbox. With the exception of the last one, they’re particularly suited for online writing

1. Dark Room for Windows and WriteRoom for Mac

Both Dark Room and WriteRoom are same tools, except that the former is for Windows and latter for Macs. They are probably the best distraction free writing software available.

2. Windows Live Writer

Windows Live Writer is undoubtedly the best desktop blogging client available. None of the other such tools, even its Mac counterparts, come close.

3. Evernote

Writing web content generally involves a good bit of research. Evernote helps in capturing and organizing notes, images, links etc so that you can quickly access them when you are doing the actual writing.

4. Freemind

Freemind is a free mind mapping software to help you generate ideas and document your thought process.

5. Pen and Paper

It’s surprising how underrated pen and paper have become in this era of laptops, cellphones and iPad. But when you are stuck with a thought, disconnecting from the computer and turning to these two tools could be the best bet to get your creative juices flowing.


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online writing tools, best online writing tools, writers tools online

Abhijeet Mukherjee is the editor of Guiding Tech, a blog that publishes in-depth articles and tutorials on all things tech, including mobile news and tutorials. He's been into web working since 2008 and continues to enjoy each day of it. He loves to interact with people so hit him up on Twitter.

Discussion

  1. Hey Thanks for the tools. I never knew such tools existed!

  2. Rikesh on the 13th July

    A whiteboard is also useful for brainstorming before writing an article.

  3. Alex P. on the 13th July

    wow thanks for the tools i did not know so much could go into online witing but im glad now because thanks to you i will be wrtiting with so much more.
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  4. Nina on the 14th July

    Thank you for sharing this. I use Seavus DropMind™. It is an excellent web and desktop mind mapping software with flexible installation across different operating systems – Windows, Mac or Linux.

  5. Christopher Masiello on the 14th July

    Abhijeet,
    Great list. I use all of these at one point or another. I love Evernote and LiveWriter. Plus, nothing beats a nice pen and notebook.
    Thanks,
    Chris

  6. MAGNUM Creative on the 14th July

    I would recommend XMind as an alternative to the mind mapping software you suggested. It’s also free, collaborative and arguably more intuitive. http://www.xmind.net

    Also toss in Google Docs as another alternative to collecting your thoughts with.

  7. Deanna on the 14th July

    Thanks so much for the info. Had never heard of Evernote before. Can’t wait to try it out.

  8. Peter North on the 15th July

    Wow, I really like WriteRoom.

    Thanks Abhijeet. Good info.

  9. Abhijeet Mukherjee on the 15th July

    Thanks all for the nice comments. 🙂

  10. Aaron Stewart on the 15th July

    Bubbl is a great online and free mind mapping application. Their beta is even better. I ditched Freemind after I found this.

    http://bubbl.us/

  11. Birgit Pauli-Haack on the 16th July

    Just tried it out and Dark Room 0.8b doesn’t work on my Windows XP machine. It failed miserably. “The application failed to initialize properly (0xc0000135)”

    A great online tool: Writer by BigHugeLabs.com Fast, easy and gets out of the way. And always available: On the web.

  12. Birgit Pauli-Haack on the 16th July

    Your link to DarkRoom goes to the 2006 version. No wonder it doesn’t work. Jeff did a total rewrite cross-platform on Adobe AIRand called DarkRoomX.

    It was in Pre-Release stage in September 2009. http://they.misled.us/archives/1225

    An updated version doesn’t seem to be available. I have not tried it yet, so maybe its already feature complete and doesn’t need an update. Who knows.

    • Mike Vardy on the 16th July

      Thanks for finding an updated version. The 2006 release of Dark Room never quite made it past 0.8 from what I can tell…yet it is still being talked about on the web today.

      Let us know if it works for you; we’d like to know if this updated edition works for anyone out there!

  13. elliott on the 23rd August

    why is windows live writer so good?

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