Introduction to Writty

Welcome and thank you for your interest in Writty! The information presented here was created to serve you as a guide on how to get started and use Writty.

Latest Versions:

Writty extensions: Version 1.4.2.
Writty macOS app: Version 1.6.3. Compatible with macOS 10.15 (Catalina) 11.2 (Big Sur) and 12.0.1 (Monterey).

What is Writty?

Writty is a simple writing tool to help writers, bloggers, copywriters, content designers and people who are into writing to focus on what matters: Writing more and better. The design is based on the principles of Calm Technology. It removes all the distractions and helps you maintain the focus on your content. If you want to know more about Writty and its story, you can read it here.

Technology

Writty is built with Javascript and packed using Electron JS.
Writty is a hybrid between an open-source project and comercial software. The open-source project is and will always be free and open to the public. On the other hand, Writty Desktop is a protected commercial app that allows you to enjoy Writty offline with a custom native experience.

If you want to contribute to the open-source project, you can do it here.

Getting Started

Add Writty to your Browser

If you are a Chrome or Firefox user, simply go to any of the links provided in writtyapp.com and follow the instructions to install the extension (Firefox Addon) or add Writty to your bookmarks (Chrome). This will add the Writty icon to your browser's bar. Every time you need to write something, simply click on the icon and Writty will open a new tab. Ready for you to take notes, write your next article or continue the chapter of your new book.

Important: Please notice that in order for Writty Browser to work properly you will need to be connected to the internet.

Install the App  App Only

If you purchased the Writty macOS app, you will need to follow the steps below to install it on your computer:

  1. Once completed the purchase, download the .zip file and unzip it.

  2. Open the .dmg installer and in the new window drag the icon to Applications.

  3. Writty is installed now.

Opening Writty  App Only

Since you are downloading Writty from a different source than the App Store, your computer might either tell you it can't open the app or will ask you if it is safe to open it. In both cases, you just need to:

  1. Open System Preferences.

  2. Click on the lock icon 🔒 and enter your password so you can make changes.

  3. Change the setting for 'Allow apps downloaded from' to 'App Store and identified developers' from just App Store.

  4. Open Writty and start writing! ✏️

If you try to open Writty and macOS stops you from doing so, that doesn't necessarily mean there is something wrong with the app. But it will indicate that the app isn't from an 'identified developer'. This can be easily sorted:

  1. Open System Preferences.

  2. Go to Security & Privacy and select the General tab.

  3. If you've been blocked from opening Writty within the past hour, it will give you the option to override this by clicking 'Open Anyway'.

  4. You'll be asked one more time if you're sure, click the 'Open' button will run the app.

  5. Open Writty and start writing! ✏️

For more information and details on how to follow these steps, please read this article.

Writing Features

The Toolbar

Writty presents a vertical toolbar to keep the main page area clean for you and your content.
You can hide and display the toolbar by navigating to the left side area next to the toolbar. Once you are there, an arrow will appear. If you click the icon, it will hide the toolbar. To show the toolbar again, just repeat the above.

With the macOS app you also can use 'cmd + left/right arrow' to hide or show the toolbar.

Type Styles

Writty comes with 4 basic type styles, these are:

Heading: For main headers and the most important titles. (Keyboard shortcut: 'ctrl + 1')

Subheading: For secondary headers and less important titles. (Keyboard shortcut: 'ctrl + 2')

Body: The body text for your main content. (Keyboard shortcut: 'ctrl + 3')

Caption: For text associated with an image or annotations. (Keyboard shortcut: 'ctrl + 4')

Bold

For highlighting the selected text to help emphasise a remark or comment. You can apply or remove Bold style by either clicking on the 'B' icon on the toolbar or via keyboard shortcut keys 'cmd + b'.
You also can remove the style by pressing 'cmd + z' right after it was applied.

Italic

Italics are a way to emphasise key points, identify types of creative works, to cite foreign words or phrases, or, when quoting a speaker.

You can apply or remove Italic style by clicking the 'I' icon on the toolbar or via the keyboard shortcut keys 'cmd + i'

You also can remove the style by pressing 'cmd + z' right after it was applied.

Underline

Underline is used to emphasise the selected text.

You can apply or remove the Underline style by clicking the 'U' icon on the toolbar or via the keyboard shortcut keys 'ctrl + u'

You also can remove the style by pressing 'cmd + z' right after it was applied.

"Quote"

Quote is used when quoting other authors, external sources or emphasising and defining quotes.

You can apply or remove the quote style style by clicking the Quote (") icon on the toolbar. one of the main typestyles (e.g. Body) or by pressing 'cmd + z" right after applying this style to remove the style from the selected text.

Superscript and Subscript

Writty comes with Superscript and Subscript. You can apply these when working with formulas or for footnotes.

You can apply or remove the Superscript or Subscript style by clicking on the two icons presented on the toolbar.

You also can remove them by pressing 'cmd + z' right after they were applied.

Bulleted and Numbered Lists

Writty comes with two types of lists. Bulleted and Numbered. You can apply these to present a list of items organised either in no specific order or in a numeric hierarchy.

You can apply or remove the list style by clicking on the two icons presented on the toolbar.
You also can remove the style by pressing 'cmd + z' right after it was applied.

Insert Link

With Writty you can add links to parts of your text.
To add links to your text you need to:

  1. Select the text.

  2. Click the 'Insert Link' icon on the toolbar.

  3. Add the URL in the input field.
    Important: In order to preserve the good practices, Writty will only open in the browser real URLs, starting with either 'http://' or 'https://'

  4. Once you enter the URL, hit enter and the link will be added to the selected text.

In order to keep Writty as simple as possible, there is not a toolbar function to remove the link. You can do this either by selecting the text containing the url and rewriting it or by pressing 'cmd + z' right after adding the URL.

Writty will always open the link in a new browser tab.

Insert Image

With Writty you can insert images in two ways:

  • By uploading the image from your computer via the icon on the toolbar.

  • By copying the image from an online source or from within Writty.

Writty's main purpose is to be a text editor. Image resizing or editing is not supported at the moment, so make sure to edit the image before adding it to your text.

Once uploaded the image, you can change its placement by copying (right-click/copy image) and pasting it to the desired place in your document.

Word and Character Counter

Writty comes with a word and character counter which is always visible together with the toolbar.
You can switch between words or characters by simply clicking the number.

Advanced Features

The Sidebar

On the right hand side you can find the sidebar. The sidebar contains all the advacend features and preferences.

To open the Sidebar you can navigate to the right side of the window, a 3 dots menu icon will appear to indicate you can expand it. Click on the icon or anywhere on the right side of the window to expand the sidebar.

If you are using Writty app for macOS you can hit 'shift + left/right arrow' to show and hide the sidebar.

Autosave

Write with ease of mind, knowing your content is always safe. Writty autosaves your work session regardless of where you are using it. You can completely quit the app or close the browser and your content will be there for you when you are back.

Writty doesn't store your content anywhere but in the local storage of your browser or the app.

Important: Autosave doesn't save your text in your local computer but in the app/browser local storage. Please always make sure you save your text locally as a Markdown or HTML file before creating a new one or clearing up the cache.

Create a New Text

The only way to erase your text from Writty is to create a new one. You can clean everything by selecting the 'New' tab in the right-hand sidebar.

Every time you select this option, Writty will erase all the existing content to give you a blank canvas for you to fill with your new content.

You can create a new text by clicking the 'New' Button on the sidebar or by pressing 'cmd + n' on your keyboard if you are using the app.

Important: Please always make sure you save your text locally as a Markdown or HTML file before creating a new one.

Open Files

Writty currently supports 2 formats. These are Markdown and HTML. At the moment you only can open these files from within the app or the browser.

You can open Markdown or HTML files by clicking the 'Open File' Button on the sidebar or by pressing 'cmd + o' on your keyboard if you are using the app.

Save Files

With Writty you can save your files in the following formats:

  • Markdown: It is the recommended format. Saving a markdown file will preserve your type styles, links and images. App keyboard shortcut: 'cmd + s'.

  • HTML: Recommended together with Markdown. Saving an HTML file will preserve your type styles, links and images. App keyboard shortcut: 'cmd + w'.

  • Plain Text (TXT): You also can save your content in plain text format. Due to the nature of this file format, type styles, links or images won't be saved. App keyboard shortcut: 'cmd + t'.

Print

With Writty you can print your documents directly from the browser or the app. This will allow you to also use the printing system of the browser or the Operative System to save the file as PDF. App keyboard shortcut: 'cmd + p'.

Important: Please notice that saving a PDF file with the app in macOS 10.15 (Catalina) will result in a read-only document. This seems to be a compatibility problem between Electron and this version of macOS. This problem doesn't occur when using the browser or if you are using macOS 10.14 (Mojave).

We strongly advise saving your content in one of the recommended formats (Markdown or HTML).

Right to Left

Writty supports Right to Left script system which allows you to write in a broader variety of languages.
You can enable RTL by clicking on the toggle presented in the right-hand sidebar.

Light/Dark Mode

With Writty you can choose between Light or Dark mode independently of your system preferences. Writty is compliant with universal color contrast guidelines to make writing more enjoyable and healthy.

You can switch between Light and Dark Mode by clicking on the toggle presented in the right-hand sidebar. Writty will remember your preference and will save it for you next time you open it.

Multi-Pages

With Writty v.16.2 we introudced multi-pages. Allowing you to write and organise your content in up to 5 separated pages. To access multi-pages simply navigate to the bottom of the screen or use 'Shift+up/down arrow' to show or hide the multi-pages.

Autosave as well as every other feature works the same for each page.

Important: Please make sure you save the content of each page before starting a new session. Starting a new session will erase the content of all the pages.

Accessibility

Keyboard Navigation

Keyboard navigation is available in Writty and it is subject to further improvements. You can navigate the toolbar and the sidebar by using the keyboard.

Keyboard Shortcuts  App only

'cmd + 1' = Apply header style to text (no need to select the text).

'cmd + 2' = Apply subheader style to text (no need to select the text).

'cmd + 3' = Apply body style to text (no need to select the text).

'cmd + 4' = Apply caption style to text (no need to select the text).

'cmd + b' = Apply bold style to text. (Default)

'cmd + i' = Apply italic style to text. (Default)

'ctrl + u' = Apply underline style to text.

'cmd + left/right arrow' = Hide/show toolbar.

'shift + left/right arrow' = Hide/show sidebar.

'shift + up/down arrow' = Hide/show Multi-pages.

'cmd + a' = Select all text.

'cmd + n' = Create a new text and erase current content.

'cmd + o' = Open Markdown or HTML files from your computer.

'cmd + s' = Save document in Markdown format.

'cmd + w' = Save document in HTML format.

'cmd + t' = Save document in plain text format.

Dictation

One of the most interesting macOS features you can use with Writty is 'Dictation'. This allows you to dictate instead of writing everything you want to say, from a simple sentence to a full chapter.

You can activate/deactivate the 'Dictation' mode by double-clicking the 'fn' key or by opening the 'Edit' tab on the top-bar and clicking 'Start dictating'.

(As a side note, this whole section was created with this feature 😉).

Speech

By enabling 'Speech', your computer will read the content for you.
You can activate/deactivate 'Speech' by navigating to the Edit tab on the top-bar and clicking 'Start/Stop Speaking' under the 'Speech' menu.

More Info

Writty is a registered trademark with the objective of distinguishing the goods or services provided by Writty from those of other companies. Trademarks are protected by intellectual property rights.

Writty Desktop App is protected under the CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0 license.

Written with Writty✏️