Ulysses May Be the App I’ve Been Searching For

Note: Ulysses is for MacOS and iOS devices only. Sorry PC people.

For a while now I’ve been thinking about how I got into blogging using Dave Winers Radio Userland and wondering if there was a way to create a similar experience but have it on all my devices.

For the uninitiated, Radio Userland was a desktop blogging platform and RSS reader all in one. Posts were written and stored on the local machine and published to the server when you were done writing.

This appeals to me because, in my opinion, working in a browser seems less intuitive to my brain. Often I find it hard to pick up where I left off and continue on with what I was writing. It also has no local backup of posts for when you’re offline, not on a network, or just not somewhere you can acquire internet access.

Ulysses allows you to write and save locally through iCloud and syncs to all your devices (yearly subscription required). You can then publish directly to your WordPress blog (self or paid hosted, doesn’t matter). The WordPress publishing is reminiscent of the now defunct DeskPM app down to the ability to add categories, tags, featured images, and even a publish later function. It allows you to write in Markdown and preview your post in theme before you publish.

While it lacks an RSS reader, one of the key features of Radio Userland the publishing and local storage capability plus the ability to write on any device I own is good enough for my needs.