Writeroom

Developer: Jesse Grosjean
Category: Productivity
Version: 2.1
Release Date: August 18, 2008
Size: 0.9 MB
Price: $1.99
Rating 10/10

I am a huge fan of WriteRoom for the Macintosh, a program that clears your screen and allows you to focus solely on writing. I've been resisting it for the iPhone because I couldn't see the benefit: everything you do on the iPhone essentially clears the screen and allows you to focus. But when I learned that the new version of WriteRoom features TextExpander support, I decided, what the hell, I'd give it a try.

It's become one of my new favorite programs.

As we all know, the experience of writing on an iPhone demands very different program attributes from writing on the Mac. What WriteRoom has done is change its philosophy for its iPhone client. On the iPhone, speed, convenience, and syncing are the most important attributes, and it knocks these out of the park.

Think of WriteRoom as a replacement for the native iPhone "Notes" app. Unless you enjoy bright yellow programs that run slowly and output in Comic Sans, you've probably found the native iPhone notes app to be a little lacking. WriteRoom is a compact, lean, and fast alternative. I have written this entire review on WriteRoom, and it's the most responsive text editing program I've ever used on this phone. It just works.

Another facet that the native Notes app falls down on is syncing. It took me a full month to discover that my notes were actually syncing to my Mail program, and now I have the delightful experience of having Comic Sans yellow notes staining my inbox. WriteRoom syncs with an online text repository called SimpleText.ws, accessible with your Google login, that seamlessly syncs your notes over your internet connection. It's not secure, but it works well for small notes and non-mission critical data. You can also access your notes directly from a browser. Both SimpleText.ws and the browser use an interface from Mac OS 9, a delightful touch to a simpler computing time.

Best of all, they seem committed to improving this program. WriteRoom is one of the first applications to work with TextExpander, so you can use all of your shortcuts in this program. As a productivity nut, I'm kind of in love. WriteRoom is a simple, fast, elegant program that just works.