Summary

Gruber shares a simple AppleScript he wrote to save MarsEdit document windows as text files, solving a minor workflow annoyance he's had for 20 years. He explains his blogging workflow: shorter posts are composed in MarsEdit, longer ones in BBEdit, and abandoned drafts need to be exported as text files rather than languishing in MarsEdit's local drafts. The script prompts with a standard Save dialog, preserving metadata like title, tags, and slug. He used it to clean out 29 old drafts from MarsEdit into Dropbox. The post is a classic Gruber exploration of tools, workflows, and the satisfaction of scratching a long-standing itch.

Key Insight

Small workflow irritations that persist for years are worth solving with simple automation, and the Mac's scripting ecosystem still enables exactly this kind of personal tool-making.

Spicy Quotes (click to share)

• 2

  Almost every item I post to Daring Fireball goes through MarsEdit, the excellent Mac blogging client from Red Sweater Software.

• 1

  I occasionally wind up with partially written posts that I don't publish, but don't want to throw away.

• 3

  BBEdit is where I go to do my most concentrated thinking.

• 2

  I didn't merely suspect but *knew* that it'd be relatively easy to write an AppleScript to add a 'Save as Text File…' feature to MarsEdit.

• 3

  When something in your workflow is bugging you, you should figure out a way to address it.

• 3

  Why I didn't write (and share) this script years ago is a mystery for the ages.

• 1

  This script helped me clean up 29 drafts, some of them years old, that had been sitting around in MarsEdit, bugging me.

Tone

reflective