No jargon, three-minute read
How AsItIs works
For anyone who asked what we are building and why it matters. If you want the technical version, the benchmark has it.
Start with a proofreader
A good proofreader touches only the words you mark.
Imagine handing a forty-page report to a proofreader with one sentence circled: fix this. A good proofreader fixes that sentence and hands the report back. A bad one also changes your spelling, your spacing and the way your tables are laid out, because that is how they like it. Now your client sees hundreds of changes and cannot find the one that mattered.
Many of the apps that show these documents as formatted pages are the bad proofreader. They do not mean harm. Every time they save, they rewrite the file in their own style, and the person who opens it next inherits the mess.
AsItIs is the good one. It changes the words you asked it to change and leaves every other character exactly as it was. If you fix two numbers, the file differs in two places, and anyone can verify that.
Proofreaders have had a mark for "leave it as it was" for four hundred years: a short line with dots beneath it, called stet. That is our logo, and it is the whole promise in one shape.
Stet. Latin for "let it stand". A proofreader's sign that a passage marked for change should be left exactly as written.
What you can do with it
Read it. Fix it. Hand it on.
Read
The file opens as a document, not as code. There is an outline down the side, a search box, zoom and a dark mode.
Fix
Click into a sentence or a table cell and type. When you save, only the lines you touched change. A small status line tells you so every time.
Hand on
Export a PDF with a cover page and page numbers, or a Word file for people who want to edit. Or send the original file back, knowing nothing else in it moved.
Questions people actually ask
Short answers, no small print.
What is markdown?
Plain text with a few symbols in it: a # before a heading, a - before each item in a list, vertical bars to draw a table. The files end in .md.
AI tools, security scanners and developers write documents this way because any program on any computer can read the result. That is why more and more of what you receive at work arrives as markdown, whether you asked for it or not.
Do I need to know markdown to use AsItIs?
No. AsItIs shows the document the way a report should look: headings, tables, lists. You click where you want to change something and type. You never have to learn the symbols.
Is my data safe?
Your files stay on your computer. AsItIs makes no internet connection unless you turn one on, and every address it could ever contact is published on this site so anyone can check. There is no account to create and no login.
Does it work offline?
Yes. Reading, editing and exporting to PDF or Word all work with no connection at all. If you buy Pro, your licence is a small file you keep, checked on your own computer. Nothing phones home.
Does it use AI?
No. AsItIs does not write text for you and does not send your text to any AI service. It helps you read, check and fix what other tools and people produced. Many of those tools are AI; AsItIs is the careful editor that comes after them.
What does it cost?
Reading and editing are free, for as long as you like. Pro costs $29, paid once, not monthly, and adds the polished exports: the security findings PDF and the styled Word file. Firms that buy on invoice pay $79 per seat, also once. There is a 30-day refund, no questions asked.
When can I use it, and on which devices?
The desktop app for Mac and Windows is in development. It opens first as a paid beta to the people on the waitlist, who get one email when that happens and one when version 1.0 ships. We will not say "available now" until it is.
Available today: a free plugin for Claude Code that checks the instruction files AI assistants read. Planned after the desktop app: an extension for VS Code and Cursor, a web viewer that opens a file in the browser without uploading it, iPhone and iPad, Android and Linux. The home page shows the current status of each.
I am technical. Where is the proof?
The benchmark page has the method, the numbers and the damage list for five common editor engines, plus a repository you can run yourself.
Anything else? Email support@asitis.app and a person will answer.
The next step: join the waitlist
A short email to confirm your address now (and one reminder if you forget), then one email when the paid beta opens and one when 1.0 ships. Founding licences (24 months of updates) go to the list first. No other mail.
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