Introducing a New Series: Alternative Ways --- Doing It in Plain Text

Ishe Chinyoka

- 5 minutes read

Table of Contents

Every computer user develops habits.

We write reports in a word processor because that is what everyone does. We open a spreadsheet whenever numbers appear. We create presentations using slide software because we rarely stop to ask whether there is another way.

Many of these habits are not the result of technical necessity. They are the result of convention.

Recently I read an article from The Document Foundation titled How Proprietary Formats Have Become Microsoft’s Main Tool for Lock-In. Whether or not one agrees with every conclusion in that article, it raises an important question that every computer user should ask:

Are we choosing our tools, or are our tools choosing us?

That question inspired a new series on The Textsmith.

Welcome to Alternative Ways.

Looking Beyond the Default

This series is not about abandoning software simply because it is proprietary.

Nor is it about declaring that one application is morally superior to another.

Instead, it asks a much simpler question:

How else could this be done using plain text?

For decades we have been taught to think in terms of applications.

“I need Word.”

“I need Excel.”

“I need PowerPoint.”

A textsmith thinks differently.

A textsmith asks:

“What is the information?”

Once the information exists as text, an astonishing number of possibilities open up.

Documents Without Word

Most people assume that producing professional documents requires a word processor.

It doesn’t.

Markdown allows us to write clean, structured documents that can later become HTML, PDF, EPUB, DOCX, or many other formats.

Instead of embedding formatting into every sentence, we describe the structure of the document:

  • headings
  • lists
  • quotations
  • code
  • tables
  • links
  • figures

The result is a document that is readable even before it is rendered.

Spreadsheets Without Spreadsheets

A spreadsheet is ultimately rows and columns.

Those rows and columns can also exist as plain text.

CSV and TSV files have powered businesses, governments, and scientific research for decades.

Once data is stored this way, it becomes available to an enormous ecosystem of tools:

  • awk
  • sort
  • uniq
  • join
  • csvkit
  • SQLite
  • Python
  • R

Instead of locking information inside a workbook, the data becomes portable.

Presentations Without Presentation Software

Slides can also begin life as text.

Using Quarto, Pandoc, or Markdown together with Reveal.js, a presentation becomes another source file under version control.

You edit it in your favorite text editor.

You track changes with Git.

You generate beautiful presentations whenever needed.

The presentation becomes reproducible rather than manually assembled.

Notes Without Databases

Many note-taking applications introduce proprietary storage formats, cloud synchronization requirements, or complex databases.

Plain Markdown files remain refreshingly simple.

A folder is a notebook.

A filename is a title.

Git becomes version history.

The operating system becomes your search engine.

Configuration Instead of Wizards

One of the recurring themes on this blog is that configuration files are not primitive.

They are empowering.

A configuration file explains itself.

It can be copied.

It can be backed up.

It can be compared.

It can be placed under version control.

It can survive long after a particular application disappears.

Freedom Through Portability

One of the greatest advantages of plain text is not merely that it is open.

It is that it refuses to belong to any single program.

A Markdown document can be edited by hundreds of editors.

A CSV file can be opened by countless applications.

A shell script written twenty years ago often still works today.

Plain text ages remarkably well.

Software comes and goes.

Text remains.

This Is Not About Rejecting Modern Software

Alternative Ways is not an anti-software campaign.

Quite the opposite.

Many modern tools embrace plain text wonderfully.

Quarto.

Pandoc.

Typst.

Git.

Reveal.js.

Hugo.

mdBook.

These tools demonstrate that innovation does not require abandoning openness.

Instead, they show how open formats become foundations for new ideas.

What You Can Expect

Over the coming months, this series will explore practical alternatives to familiar workflows.

Among the topics we will visit are:

  • Writing reports in Markdown instead of Word.
  • Creating spreadsheets using CSV and text-processing tools.
  • Building presentations with Reveal.js.
  • Managing notes using plain text.
  • Personal finance using plain text accounting.
  • Diagrams created from text.
  • Mathematics written in LaTeX, Typst, and AsciiMath.
  • Configuration instead of graphical settings.
  • Data analysis with plain-text pipelines.
  • Publishing books and websites from a single Markdown source.

Some of these approaches may not replace traditional office software for every user.

That is perfectly acceptable.

The goal is not replacement for its own sake.

The goal is choice.

Why This Matters

Lock-in rarely happens overnight.

It begins with one document that only one program understands.

Then another.

Eventually years of work become dependent upon software whose future is outside our control.

Plain text offers another path.

Not because it is fashionable.

Not because it is nostalgic.

But because it gives ownership back to the author.

As textsmiths, we believe that information should outlive applications.

Our tools should serve our ideas—not imprison them.

That is the spirit behind Alternative Ways.

I hope this series encourages you to look at your computer with fresh eyes.

Not by asking, “Which application should I open?”

But by asking something much more powerful:

“Can this begin as plain text?”

You may be surprised by how often the answer is “Yes.”