Tag: ghostwriter markdown editor

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My favorite writing tool is KDE’s Ghostwriter markdown editor. Back in 2021, I installed Ghostwriter on a computer running Manjaro Linux and encountered a segmentation fault when I tried to launch it. I eventually found a fix and described it in an article. Since then, I had no trouble installing and running Ghostwriter on multiple systems (usually Arch-based EndeavourOS) until I installed it on my new laptop running Fedora 40. After installing, Ghostwriter failed to launch. I had a bad feeling about the culprit and confirmed when I tried to launch from the terminal that Ghostwriter had segfaulted. You may be wondering where my solution article is. For my laptop, I uninstalled the Fedora package version of Ghostwriter and replaced it with the Flatpak, which works without any problem. One reason I did not do that in 2021 was because the Flatpak (note 2021 was before Ghostwriter became a KDE app) was out of date. However, the Flatpak is now keeping up with the non-Flatpak version, so I saw no reason to not just go with it and check again later to see if the issue with the regular version resolves itself in a future release.

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I send a weekly newsletter attached to The New Leaf Journal called The Newsletter Leaf Journal. Unsurprisingly, I focus on sharing links to my latest articles (including some from here) and news and notes about my projects. However, in the spirit of generosity and sharing external links, I pack each newsletter full of links from around the web (21 per issue, as of late). I had a markdown file with links and comments ready to use in future newsletters. This file was over 9,200 words. I managed to lose the file while reorganizing my documents, notwithstanding the fact that my preferred markdown editor, Ghostwriter, creates automatic backups (single-version automatic backups hit a snag when you accidentally write over markdown your file but keep the same name). Maybe I would have been safe the markdown document was not in one of the few working folders that I was not syncing with my favorite app, Syncthing). But the past is the past. I guess that we will be starting fresh as we prepare to turn the calendar to 2024. Fortunately, I have more than enough new links to keep things rolling (so do subscribe via email or RSS).

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The Classic Editor in WordPress by Jack Baty (Baty.net)
I thought for sure I would finally settle in with WordPress for a while, but Gutenberg always annoys. Some of it is handy, but mostly I just feel frustrated when writing anything more than a paragraph or two. Several people, noticing my frustration, recommended that I try the Classic Editor plugin, so that’s what I’m doing now.

I am using the Classic Editor here at The Emu Café Social, in large part because some of the IndieWeb plugins I am using require it instead of Gutenberg. I agree with this take by Mr. Baty in a vacuum that  the classic editor is better for writing than Gutenberg. However, I use Gutenberg over at my main WordPress-powered project, The New Leaf Journal. The reasons are two-fold:

  1. Drafting articles in markdown (I like Ghostwriter) and converting them using Pandoc for use on WordPress provides a superior workflow to both Gutenberg and the Classic Editor.
  2. Because I draft my long articles outside of WordPress (with a few exceptions), I am more concerned with formatting. Gutenberg works better for me for that purpose than the TinyMCE editor.

(I will note, however, that Gutenberg footnotes almost cost me a great deal of work on a recent project.)