“Ulysses Hit the Sweet Spot"

All kinds of authors are using Ulysses for their writing, and we asked some of them to share their stories. Sid O’Neill runs a creative agency, and is a dedicated blogger as well as spare-time fiction writer.

Which role does writing play in your life?

I run a little creative agency, and my job involves a lot of copywriting. I also use a lot of my free time writing for my personal site (about 100,000 words per year) and various languishing fiction projects. Wow. (Eyes widen.) I spend an unhealthy amount of time typing.

Could you describe what you use Ulysses for?

Absolutely everything that I write starts in Ulysses (unless I already began to write it in Daedalus Touch). I even paste things that I’m editing into Ulysses. Sadly, in the publishing world, almost everything has to eventually leap into the yawning abyss of Word or InDesign. But I do my best to avoid that until the very last moment.

Why did you choose Ulysses?

I even paste things that I’m editing into Ulysses.

I did some research. OK, I did a lot of research. I have a research habit. What I found was that there were a lot of options that were simpler than Ulysses, and a lot that were much more complicated. Ulysses hit the sweet spot. Also, it just looks so dang pretty. So when I won almost exactly the purchase price in a poker game, it was what Americans call a “no-brainer”. For a few years now Markdown has been an integral part of my life — my site uses it now, for one — and I have’t seen anything that’s better at handling Markdown. Displaying it, exporting it, it works smoother than a greased chicken sliding off a diplodocus. I’d recommend it to anyone, whether they’re blogging, publishing, writing a novel. Especially that latter. It’s just enough complexity to keep a book organized without getting in the way of the writing like some other apps I could mention. (Sly wink.)

Do you have a favorite feature?

I did not realize until quite recently how great the Preview is. The word count goals feature is very cool, too. And the keyboard shortcuts are handy. I am unable to pick a favorite feature because I love them all with an equal intensity.

Sid’s writing can be found online at crateofpenguins.com.