Working pre-medium and in-medium
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For a while I've been toying with the idea of writing posts by hand
with pencil and paper, rather than going straight to a word processor
when I have a thought. So I'm giving it a shot; I'll transcribe later 
with Vim or ed. Of course it will make no difference to the reader. 
My thinking is that there is an important difference between the kind 
of work we do "pre-medium" vs. "in-medium." By which I mean:

- Pre-medium: planning, anticipatory work; something like a "draft" or
"design" before going into the "final" phase of production; low
stakes, work in progress...

- In-medium: execution, what you see is what you get, the product;
still room for improvisation, adaptation (there must always be some),
but fundamental changes in course are generally harder...

Architectural drawings, for example, are decidedly pre-medium;
construction is in-medium. Of course these things are matters of
degree, and to some extent "finality" is relative to the stage of the
process and one's role in that process (so that there are "final"
drawings and earlier, more preliminary drawings; the former in-medium,
the latter pre-medium, from the perspective of the draftsman).

What I find strange and alarming is the degree to which the personal
computer has allowed/afforded/forced the collapse of many processes,
and now working in-medium, with a high degree of plasticity
(reversibility, malleability) is the norm. Writers (bless them) write
largely in Word or something similar, moving text around without much
thought - indeed, in-medium is now the first manner of thought, which
is often quick, intuitive, like manipulating blocks on the floor;
sorting, stacking, etc. - this is so often how we are taught to work.

I know that at least in the context of creative work (music, graphic
design, illustration) I find my thinking and intuition to be guided
by what I know the present medium affords; an application like
Photoshop sometimes leaves a significant impression on not only the
aesthetics of the work, but the concept. Whereas concepts devised well
in advance - closer to the problem, pre-medium - often have a
different feeling. I also know that for some aspects of coding I can
get along just fine working and solving problems directly in the
editor, setting things up and testing things in a way that seems to
rely on short-term memory and a temporary grasping and manipulation of
elements. But there is almost always a point at which I find it
necessary to stop, step back, and reconnect with the design problem -
often by writing out pseudocode, restating the problem in different 
ways, making drawings - and when I do, the character of the solutions 
is different.

I'm sure there are sophisticated accounts of this phenomenon devised
by people smarter than me - Kahneman's "fast" and "slow" thinking
comes to mind, and goes some of the way towards explaining the 
difference. There's also affordance theory - maybe I'll read about the
latter in greater detail and realize it's all there.

All this to say: if you find spelling errors in my posts, now you know
why.