also you can turn off ai summaries. you just hit one really obvious button once and they're gone?? will report back if they return.

i am so horrified over the AI bullshit change Google is doing I am actively looking for ways on switching everything I possibly had with them with alternatives. Specially my docs.

I'm currently running duckduckgo via firefox and so far having a great experience. I'll include under cut how to do this for other chromebook users

-> Settings

-> Account

-> It will show your email at the top of the page

-> Click the pencil icon next to your email and then put in your preferred email address and your password

-> Go to your preferred email, there should be a confirmation email from Tumblr

-> Click “This is me!” and you’re done!!

My requirements:

Over the years, I've narrowed down what I like in a writing app, and just to give a baseline of what my workflow looks like I'll delineate it here:

Saves in Markdown

Markdown is basically just plain text, so markdown files are completely system and software agnostic and in a pinch could be read on basically any computer with a simple file extension change

File tree access

I know people like tags. Those people are wonderful people! But I just want to store my ideas, WIPs, notes, and completed works in an organized folder hierarchy. I genuinely don't understand why this aspect of file systems is becoming eroded in the modern era. (If anyone has any insight here, let me know, I'm genuinely curious why I have to explain folder structures at work so often these days!)

OS agnostic

I use an iPhone, an iPad, a MacBook, a Debian Linux laptop, a PopOS Linux desktop, and an Android e-ink tablet regularly; I want to be able to access my work on all of these devices seamlessly, and be able to work on fic or take notes for ideas "on the go" no matter what device I have with me.

Related to the above: some sort of cloud sync with my choice of provider (so not GDrive, Dropbox, or iCloud only.)

I also have some "wants" that I'm more flexible on, but they're still high on my priority list:

Live wordcount.

Handles novel length documents (this is difficult, more on this later, or maybe I'll make a third post.)

Workflow Basics

Here's my workflow in a nutshell:

Write in Obsidian on my MacBook

Sync using my own NextCloud instance

Use the Nextcloud app to do quick notes on iOS

Use Ellipsus to share for beta

Post on AO3 using Ellipsus's export tools

OR

Use the Copy HTML plugin to copy from Obsidian to post to AO3

Obsidian is... annoying. I secretly hate Obsidian. That said, Obsidian is sort of the Swiss Army knife of writing tools. It also satisfies 90% of my needs and wants, and it's got a robust plugin economy that supports JavaScript plugins, so I can hit 99% if I'm clever about it.

Things that Obsidian does not do:

Handle novel length documents

Officially support third party syncing (They sell a syncing subscription that's 8$ a month and may be worth it to skip the shenaniganery I get up to.)

Work well when syncing between iOS/iPadOS and any non-Apple OS unless you're using iCloud or their paid sync option.

To be clear: syncing to and from MacOS works fine using any cloud provider out of the box. It's specifically iOS/iPadOS that have issues

Workflow

I have Obsidian installed on my MacBook, my Linux devices, and my de-Googled e-ink Android tablet (the OnyxBoox Tab Ultra, which isn't made anymore. I think the Tab X C is the closest equivalent they currently sell). I self-host a Nextcloud server that I use to sync a folder on all of these devices, and I saved my Obsidian vault in this folder. (The Obsidian Vault is just a fancy way to describe what parent folder Obsidian has access to, and where you would save and organize your files, called Notes, inside the Obsidian app)

You can do the same thing and still avoid Google by using a privacy focused cloud storage solution, just make sure that you install the app on every device and set up the designated folder as the location of your Obsidian Vault. If you want to have more control and don't leave your home network often, you can instead set up Syncthing. If you want to use Syncthing with iOS and have a Mac computer, you can sync your iCloud folder to your Syncthing folder on your Mac using FreeFileSync but at that point setting up a Nextcloud instance in Docker is literally easier; believe me, I've done both.

On my iPad or iPhone, I can use the Nextcloud app to edit Markdown files quickly and easily, and since Obsidian retains a clear and externally accessible file folder hierarchy, this works fine for me. If I really want a deep writing session on one of those devices, I open the file in iWriter Pro (a beautiful app that I like significantly better than Obsidian, but it's missing features I need that I can use plugins to get and is Apple only, and is a separate purchase for MacOS and iOS/iPadOS). On Android, you'll probably need to go into the cloud storage app before and after writing sessions to force a sync, but it's only a few seconds and worth not using Google Docs, in my opinion.

Obsidian struggles with large files; most software struggles with large files, but Obsidian's limit is around the 28k word mark, depending on a variety of factors. If you work in chapters by default or only write shorter work, then this next section can be skimmed, as it's not that useful outside of people who get trapped by the muses into writing long works.

Obsidian Plugins

First, P. D. Workman's blog posts on working with Obsidian are an invaluable resource. As such I won't go deep into exactly what I do beyond explaining my favorite plugins to make Obsidian usable. If anyone does particularly want my take, please hit me up and I'll make yet another separate post on this.

General QOL

Better Word Count: shows a live wordcount at the bottom of your open document.

Copy Document as HTML: lets you right click and copy your Markdown formatted text as HTML so you can paste it into the HTML editor on AO3

New Tab +: opens documents as new tabs in Obsidian. The fact that this isn't default behavior, or at least togglable, is emblematic of the reasons I kind of hate Obsidian.

Novel Word Count: shows a wordcount next to file names in the file tree views in Obsidian. Honestly this is the best plugin ever, I'm sorely tempted to put this functionality in my "Want" list.

Long Document Plugins This is the order in which I use them, with a brief explanation of why:

Note Refactor: once a document in Obsidian starts lagging, I use this plugin to split the document at my scene breaks. You can configure what criteria it uses to split your document, so you could also use this to split by chapter, or just go shove in some unique text strings to split up wherever you want. It's fairly flexible. If you find yourself using this a lot, you'll probably want to get into the habit of numbering your scenes; you can also number your scenes after the fact using the built in Obsidian Outline panel, but if you wait until the document is struggling to load, then you'll very frustrated the whole time you're doing it.

Continuous Mode: displays all open notes as one continuous document, so once you break up your scenes you can still read them all straight through if you'd like.

Longform: stitches your scenes back together prior to posting. You can specify a bunch of things to add or strip from the scenes, and this has really robust JavaScript template support, so as you get more comfortable with this you can do a ton with it. Keep in mind, once you re-assemble the document with Longform, if it's longer than what Obsidian easily supports, it will be sluggish and miserable to use in Obsidian again; luckily you probably don't actually need to interact with it inside Obsidian anymore at this point.

Collaboration and final touches:

So Ellipsus and Proton Drive support Markdown import.

Once I've finished up with my personal revisions, I either use the Copy as HTML plugin to post immediately, or I want to get it beta-read. You can import directly to Proton Drive as markdown and then convert it to a document, or you can import to Ellipsus. Use the sharing features to share with beta-readers or whoever. Get your comments and edits. Merge your changes. Live life to the utmost.

I like Ellipsus because I like the themes, I like that you can export to AO3 supported HTML with a button, and I like that they support find+replace using regular expressions now, an important part of my workflow since I accidentally fell into Mandalorian worldbuilding hell and use CSS in my AO3 uploads now and need an easy way to embed it.

Ellipsus has some really freaking weird limitations such as sharing to view only being an entirely separate share option from sharing to collaborate and requiring all collaborators to have an account, but they're pretty responsive to feedback; early in the beta process I would get responses to bug reports within minutes to hours. Now I don't do bug reports as often, so I can't speak to their current turnaround times, but they really made a good impression on me.

Conclusion

I probably shouldn't be allowed to design workflows. I spend more time perfecting them than actually writing. But I wrote this post in Obsidian, if that helps anyone make a decision, and this is what currently works for me. It's straightforward enough to do in a way that's completely free to the user, supports your privacy, and your creativity.

Ever since Youtube's AI age verification policy left a bad taste in many people's mouths and it seemingly gotten worse after that... I thought I could help someone out by making a list of recommendations of alternatives to exorcise yourself of Google demons.

(This is going to be a bit long, press the button to take a look)