For a few years now, I have been using both Ulysses and Bear for different functions. General note-taking was done in Bear, and my blogging and gaming was done in Ulysses. There was a little overlap, with interesting articles and ideas being saved in Bear and not in Ulysses. I like both apps a great deal, and like features from each in different ways. But I started thinking about whether I could use one app or the other, and not both. That had led me to what I am doing now: evaluating whether I can use Bear for all my writing and note-taking, and not use Ulysses at all.

Let me rewind a year or so ago. I was burned a few times by Ulysses and their sync capability. While both Ulysses and Bear use iCloud to sync between devices, there were a few times when Ulysses was just wipe itself on my Mac, and I would have to wait overnight for it to recover all my writing from iCloud.

It seemed like there was one month where it happened 4 times, and I really, really considered ditching Ulysses. And that stinks, because I love the app. It is the best app I found for sheer writing in Markdown. When I looked at moving everything to Bear, though, something gave me pause. No, I can’t remember exactly what it was, but I believe it had to do with Bear locking up with the large number of notes. I didn’t write down the details, so I can’t say exactly what happened.

Anyway, Ulysses seemed to fix something because I have not had any issues since then. But recently I have been looking at all my subscription costs, and came across the bills for Ulysses ($50/year) and Bear ($15/year). Not terrible but not so great.

I just noticed on the Bear Pricing page that the price for the Pro version is now $30/year. Still not bad.

I also realized that one of the features I liked in Ulysses was the clicky-click ability to upload articles from Ulysses directly into Medium and Ghost. Well, as I write now on Write.as, that feature no longer applies. So—can I move my writing completely over to Bear?

Right now I have about 5,100 notes in Bear. I can see that easily being at least 10,000, and maybe 15,000 or more when I move everything over. I have seen online that some users have had no issues at 10,000 notes, so I am still worried a tad. I have seen my iPad lock up in Bear for a couple minutes when I have moved a lot over on my Mac, and (I think) Bear on the iPad is syncing up. If that is just a price to pay while I move things over, fine. But it is a deal breaker if it continues.

So—has anyone done this kind of evaluation? Have you had a large database of notes in Bear and seen any issues? I am really curious to hear any feedback!

Marc #tech #writing #gaming #bear #ulysses

I’ve tried others, and I keep coming back to the simplicity of Apple apps. Everyone has a number of apps that they use everyday to help them get by—email and calendar apps, maybe a note taking tool, a task management app and a few other functions. There are tons of apps out there that meet these needs, and I have looked at a lot of them. I was searching for the perfect ones—and in all cases but one, I just went back to Apple.

What I Tried

I don’t known how many apps I downloaded and tried out, especially for task management. Really, I don’t know. Lots. It was almost an obsession.

My heaviest tools/functions I use on a daily basis are email, task management, note taking and calendar management. Other functions I need, but not as frequently include a password management and something to see the weather.

For a long time I was just using Gmail and a web browser for my email. It was simple, platform independent and just worked. Then I started using Spark, and I really liked it. It had a lot of functions that I used—not so much the AI and other fancy bells & whistles, but just good old fashioned email management. Unfortunately, it also came with a $50/year price tag.

I also started using Fantastical for my calendar. It worked on my devices, and had some nice calendar management features. Again, I didn’t use a lot of the fancy tools, but it did what I needed. I never signed up for the paid account, but the tool did cost to download.

For note taking, I looked around quite a bit, but eventually found Bear. It is Apple-only, but it really does everything I need. I have been templed by a lot of the new generation of fancy note apps, but have stuck with my Bear. It costs, too—$15/year.

Task management is where I really went crazy. Boy, did I. Eventually I settled on Todoist. Todoist really scratched my itch for managing my tasks and turned out to be a really great tool. It’s free, but I paid the $48/year for the Pro account.

I also used Bitwarden for my password management (although not like I really should—I just listed my passwords in a secure list, not integrated with my apps or browsers). I used Weather Underground for weather, too. And yes—that had an annual price tag as well.

Are you sensing a trend here?

What I Use Now—And What I Found

What I found was that in every case but one I didn’t need to be shelling out over $100 each year for apps subscriptions.

I got on a kick of reducing the money I was spending every month and part of that was my app subscriptions. That led me eventually to reevaluate all of the apps I was using and see if I could get to a zero cost solution. What I found was that Apple had apps that met my needs, and they were all there on all my devices already—for free.

The first app I looked at was Todoist. Now Todoist is a really wonderful app, and that caused pain my heart to let them go. But when I took a look at Apple Reminders, I saw that it had really come a long way. In fact, it did everything I needed. It may not have all of the functions that other people need—but it did what I needed it to do. I did have to recreate all of my tasks from Todoist in Reminders, but I took that opportunity to clean out any outdated tasks and set things up for how I needed them now.

Then I looked at Spark. I had less of an emotional attachment to Spark, so when I looked at Apple Mail, it wasn’t that hard to switch. My biggest need was that it worked as a front end for Startmail, which I switched to instead of Gmail (more on that in another rant). I found that it does that perfectly. Again—it may not meet everyone’s needs, but it meets mine. The only issue that I found is that Mail does not have a Share function like their other apps—I like being able to send an email to another app (like Bear).

I then looked at Fantastical. Again—Apple Calendar does what I need, and just works. One thing I am really liking in Calendar, too is the native integration with Reminders. Yes, Fantastical did that, too, but it was a kludgy integration, where this is all native. Goodbye, Fantastical.

I found the same result when I looked at Weather Underground, too. Apple Weather just works, and is already there. Honestly, I really didn’t see any difference.

Password management was bit more involved. I had been using both Bitwarden and Apple Keychain, but when Apple came out with Passwords, I finally had to make the break and switch everything to that app. It integrates with all my other apps, especially the ones in the Apple ecosystem—and it’s free. Migrating my passwords (and cleaning them up) was a huge chore, but once I was done, it was worth it.

The one app I did NOT migrate to is Apple Notes. This is just a personal preference thing, but I love my Markdown writing. Notes does not support Markdown, Bear does. I also like the way that Bear uses tags instead of folders. That lets me have a note be found through multiple paths, not just one specific folder. And hey, I like the Bear interface better. So I’m sticking with Bear and not moving to Notes. That may change in the future, but not right now.

What You Should Use

Obviously, you should use what works for you. You do you. But I do recommend trying out the default Apple suite if you are an Apple user. Yes, this only applies to people that have sold their souls to the cult of Apple, but if you are a Mac/iOS user, these apps really do work, and you already have them.

And that is a big point I want to make: these apps are already there. Whether you see them as free or that you have already paid for them is up to you. Let’s just say that you do not have to pay any more for them.

The other point I want to make is that they just work. Unless you are a power user who needs a lot of special functions and integrations, these apps have a simplicity that is just great. Say what you want about Apple, but they do have a way of making great user interfaces.

Well, that’s my story. I hate being a fanboy and all that, but their products just work for me. I left the farm and explored new lands, but the prodigal son returned to Apple. And yes, I’m loving it.

Marc #productivity #tech #apple #bear

(This was originally published on Medium on February 17, 2025).