I have used many tools over the years. Typewritters, computers, word processors, thousands of pencils and pens, enough empty journal books and spiral bound notebooks to open my own library. Many, many, many tools.
Since 1994, I have used computer text more than anything. I still own my old Corona, but the thing I miss the most in a typewriter is backspace.
I admit it, I am a backspace junkie.
The problem is, I believe, my mind moves faster than my fingers. Voila. Backspace. Barring that, I use spell check a lot.
There was a time I wrote in long hand, I still do in fact. It's the age thing. I have always had mild arthritis, but in the last fifteen years or so, it has gotten worse and I have had to find alternate ways to get my scribbles onto the page. I have found that my Dana from Alphasmart works really nice when I am out somewhere. It's instant on and has autosave. I carry it in my hand bag; which is a whole other article on it's own.
I use highlighters ( every color), sticky tabs, and post it notes. I use them in books, files and on things I print for "go withs." These printouts can be anything from an article I am reading on a blog or my reader to a website I am working on. I feel the need to mark, mark, mark, and highlight. I am forever estatic I don't use school or library owned books anymore. I got into the habit of owning them and jotting notes and stuff when I was in tech school and it never left. If I own it, I MARK it.
One other thing I keep with me is the dictionary of whatever I am working on. Sometimes it's English, but I have used Japanese, Hebrew, Russian, Celtic, Norse and French. Several of the characters I write about are versed in foreign languages. I also have a rhyming dictionary and "The Big Red Book".The big red book is the Synonym Finder and I have gone through two copies in the last ten years. I also suggest Word Finder, Phrase Finder, and Elements of Style. A reverse dictionary is also a good reference to have on hand. You can find any of these on Amazon
Finally my last writing tool is books. I read all the time. Though I spend six to eight hours a day writing; content, fiction, web pages. I spend almost that much reading. I can honestly say I read a mininum of a hundred new books a year, at least new to me; and probably 200 more old stand bys that I can zip through in a couple of hours. I can't even begin to count all the ebooks, articles, and blogs I read. I am guessing at least a thousand or more.
The point is, I read. Alot. The written word is so important to me, that books rank as some of my precious possessions. Messing with one of my books is one of the very few things that will get a person onto my s-list, with a minute chance of ever getting off.
Recently my son bought me a Dell Mini laptop. This is a neat little thing. I can go to the mall, boot it up, plug in my FreeAgent hard drive and work to my hearts content. If I get a hotspot, I am in hog heaven. I can check whatever web page I'm working on as I am working. When I get home, I save everything, everytime to my external hdd, just in case something crashes. I still use the Dana a lot, mainly because of the autosave. Unless I run the batteries dead (which I have done on the rare occasion) it saves and reopens to the same file I was working on. Then all I have to do on a 'puter is open a text file, send and save as whatever I need. Dana won't save anything as a html file, but I can do that when I save stuff to my desk top or laptop.