Newsletter, October 2025

Back in the Saddle

Writing projects and life kept me from Medium, but I’m back. Here are some goodies and what’s in the pipeline.

Photo by Yasmina H on Unsplash

I haven’t spent much time on Medium this year, partly because I’ve been developing new writing skills for book projects, and partly because I’ve been travelling.

Both activities, however, have given me lots of ideas for articles, so I expect to add content at least once a month. One topic will be on productivity boosts offered by iPadOS/iOS/macOS, especially in the area of AI.

Yes, Apple have been lambasted for its handling of AI, but the corporation is quietly putting that right. I’ll be writing about my experience of putting it to practical use.

The autumn also brings new Apple hardware, and I expect to invest/indulge. Expect hardware reviews/comparisons.

Meanwhile…

eBook on Apple Notes

All subscribers are entitled to a free copy of my eBook about Apple Notes. I’ve been tardy about sending that link out to new subscribers, so here are the details:

Download your free booklet from my page on Gumroad. This is the URL.

https://willjm.gumroad.com/l/grcvxl

Use this discount code at checkout:
MediumSubscriber0622

The discount field is underneath the product name and thumbnail.

This definitely needs an update, and when it’s available, I’ll send a link out in this newsletter.

Free utilities on TheWillfullWriter.com

I’ve been having fun with Claude and ChatGPT writing Javascript applets, and they’re available on my website, TheWillfulWriter.com. My website runs on Squarespace, so I don’t have the capability to run apps server-side, meaning all the apps run on the client browser.

Prompting the AIs to write the apps didn’t take long at all. What took time was formatting the pages on Squarespace. That was more to do with my inexperience than any issue with Squarespace.

Feel free to use them. I don’t charge for any of the apps, and I don’t gather data. There are no adverts either.

Here they are:

Color Palette Extractor

I dabble in photography, and I’m getting into colour grading. Occasionally, it’s useful to know the palette of a photo. Load a photo and extract the palette.

Try out app.

Invisible Code Detector

Sometimes simple text isn’t so simple, especially when it has been generated by an AI. Copy your text into this app, and it will scan it for special characters, which it then removes.

Try out app.

Text Line Sorter & Deduplicator

From time to time, it’s useful to sort lines of text and remove duplicates. This simple app does exactly that. It will sort text alphabetically or numerically.

More on the way.

Upcoming Articles

I recently visited Italy and took too many photos (over 2000). I didn’t want to visually inspect every image, so I wondered if Apple AI could help. Turns it can with a few caveats.

It should go up on Medium this week.

Enjoy October!