Writing Workflows: Beyond Word Processing

Lockridge, Tim

doi:doi:10.3998/mpub.11657120

Writing Workflows: Beyond Word Processing

Tim Lockridge and Derek Van Ittersum 2020

The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Sweetland Center for Writing in making this book possible.

Open Access

Since the late 1990s, writing process research has often treated the tools of writing as an invisible variable or idiosyncratic choice. For example, writing process research might examine how a writer develops ideas or moves through drafts, but it often omits the role of tools: a favorite fountain pen, a trusty yellow memo pad, or a mobile notetaking app. Writing Workflows: Beyond Word Processing uses the concept of the "writing workflow" to bring attention to those seemingly invisible tool choices. Through a type of reflection that the authors call "workflow thinking," writers can look at their processes and ask how tools shape their habits—and how a change in tools might offer new ways of thinking and writing. Similarly, the book also introduces a practice the authors call "workflow mapping," which helps writers trace their tool preferences across time. Through workflow mapping a writer can better see how their tool preferences have accrued over time and imagine how new technologies might fit in. Ultimately, the book offers these new theories to help researchers better understand how writing process shapes the tools of writing, and how the tools of writing, in turn, also shape writing process.

Series

Sweetland Digital Rhetoric Collaborative

ISBN(s)

978-0-472-12726-9 (open access)

Subject

Citable Link

Filtering by: Creator Lockridge, Tim

Start Over

Workflow Map with Evernote at Center

From Introduction

Fig02. Workflow maps, which we introduce in chapter 6, use layered diagrams to consider how writing practices and preferences accrete over time.

Screenshot of the “Users” control panel in Mac OS

Screenshot of the Mac OS User Control Panel

From Chapter 1

Fig04. As part of her suggested workflow, Jensen recommends that writers make a second “writing” account on their computer to open and close their projects each day. This screenshot shows the Mac OS operating system “Users” panel with a similar configuration.

Screenshot of the Ulysses writing app export window

Screenshot of the iOS Ulysses writing app

From Chapter 1

Fig05. The writers introduced in this book prefer writing technologies like Ulysses, pictured here, that support modular and multiple means of moving through writing tasks. This screenshot shows the Ulysses export menu, where a user can export text to several formats, including HTML, ePub, PDF, .docx, and others.