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The evolution of Linux and Web-based tools complement each other, making it possible for any writer to get the job done (and well done) on Linux. But what tools do you need? You may be surprised to find that in some cases, using 100% open source tools can't do this effectively. But even so, the work can always be done. Let's take a look at the tools I've been using as a technical writer and novelist. I will outline this through the writing process of fiction and non-fiction (because the process is different and requires specific tools).

Give a warning to serious Linux hard-core users. A long time ago, I gave up using tools like LaTeX and DocBook to write. Why? Because for me, the focus must be on the content, not on the process. When you face a deadline, you must put efficiency first.

Non-fiction

We will start with non-fictional writing, because this is the simpler process of the two. To write the technical guide, I work with different editors and, in some cases, have to copy / paste the content into CMS. But like my novel, the whole process always starts with the Google cloud hard drive. At this point, many open source purists turn around and walk away. Don't worry, you can always choose to keep all your files locally, or you can use a more open and friendly cloud service (such as Zoho or nextCloud).

Why start in the cloud? Over the years, I've found that I need to be able to access that content anytime, anywhere. The simplest solution is to migrate to the cloud. I'm also paranoid about losing my work. To do this, I use tools such as Insync to keep my Google cloud hard drive in sync with my desktop. With desktop synchronization, I know that my work is always backed up, in case something goes wrong with Google's cloud hard drive.

For those customers with whom I have to input content into the content management system (CMS), this process ends. I can copy / paste directly from the Google document into CMS and do this. Of course, for technical content, screenshots are always involved. To do this, I use Gimp, which makes it easy to take screenshots:

Figure 1: screenshot using Gimp.

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Open Gimp.

Click File > create > Screenshot.

Select a single window, the entire screen, or the area to capture (figure 1).

Click grab.

Most of my customers prefer to use Google documents because I can share folders so that they can access the content reliably. I have some customers who can't use Google documents, so I have to download the files into a format that I can use. To do this, all I have to do is download the .odt format, open the document in LibreOffice (figure 2), format it as needed, save it to the format required by the customer, and then send the document.

Figure 2: open the Google document I downloaded in LibreOffice.

Non-fiction is fine.

Novel category

It's going to get a little complicated here. The initial steps are the same, because I always write each first draft of the novel in the Google document. When I'm done, I download the file to the Linux desktop, open it in LibreOffice, format it as needed, and save it as a file type supported by the editor (unfortunately, that means .docx).

The next step in the process becomes a bit trivial. My editors prefer to use comments to track changes (because it makes it as easy for both of us to read the document as to make changes). As a result, a 60k word document can contain hundreds of comments, which makes LibreOffice as slow as crawling. Once upon a time, you could increase the memory used for documents, but starting with LibreOffice 6, this is no longer feasible. This means that any large, novel-like document with a lot of comments will not be available. Therefore, I had to take some extreme measures to use WPS Office (figure 3). Although this is not an open source solution, WPS Office does well with a lot of comments in the documentation, so you don't have to deal with the hassle of LibreOffice (when dealing with large files with hundreds of comments).

Figure 3:WPS can easily handle a large number of comments.

Once my editor and I have finished editing the book (all comments have been deleted), I can open the file in LibreOffice for final formatting. After the formatting is complete, I save the file in .html format, and then open the file in Calibre to export the file to .mobi and .epub formats.

Calibre is a must-have tool for anyone who wants to publish on Amazon, Barnes&Noble, Smashwords, or other platforms. Caliber is better than other similar solutions because it allows you to edit .epub files directly (figure 4). This is absolutely necessary for Smashword (because the export process adds elements that are not accepted on the Smashwords transformation tool).

Figure 4: edit the epub file directly in Calibre.

At the end of the writing process (or sometimes while waiting for the editor to complete a proofreading), I will start making a cover for the book. This task is handled entirely in Gimp (figure 5).

Figure 5: create the cover of POTUS in Gimp.

This completes the process of creating a novel on the Linux platform. Because of the length of the document and the way some editors work, it may become a little more complex than the process of creating a non-fiction, but it is far from challenging. In fact, creating novels on Linux is as simple (and more reliable) as other platforms.

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