I created another different prototype of lovecraft copywork yesterday.

I was thinking an “online book” version might be interesting.

  • One story per chapter.
  • Brief history of the story.
  • Synopsis of the story.
  • Structure of the story.
  • All prose for the story.
  • Selected passages from the story.
  • References for further reading.

The idea is that one could choose to do copywork with the whole or parts of the story, or with the selected passages.

It was not great. Too bland and boring.

Here’s a screenshot:

Specifically:

The prose was a wall of text that felt like too much work.

In no way was it fun or exciting.

The old app, although crap, larger fonts and simple design. I was closer to “fun”

For example:

This got me thinking, maybe explore other interfaces for my previous web-app based version.

I did some searching around for inspiration, here’s what I found:

David Lobo shared screenshot of a prototype for a copywriting copywork app on Twitter/X called Daily Copywriting Practice:

What I like about this interface:

  • Prose on the left, typing on the right
  • All prose on the right.
  • Text turns green when “typed over”.
  • Current word highlighted in yellow
  • Enter one word at a time
  • Progress bar showing x/y words
  • Current “Day” and “Date” for creating a daily habit

Nice work!

I found a webapp called Copyworking.

It requires a sign up, but there is a “try it out” section.

Here’s a screenshot:

What I like about this interface:

  • Author chooser for changing sample text
  • Prose on the left, typing on the right (again)
  • Prose limited to one “passage”
  • Current sentence is underlined in green
  • Progress indicator showing x/y words

Finally, I found a desktop application called Copywork.app.

Here’s a screenshot:

What I like about this interface:

  • The user provides the text
  • The app keeps track of all text and progress.
  • All prose presented in light font color, which turns dark after typing over it
  • Progress indicator showing x/y words
  • Progress indicator in sidebar as a circle, ticked when done

Time for another prototype, testing some of these ideas.