Writing Software: Scrivener

[Montero]

I don't really know what you mean by "the plotting tool". You mean the main window, where you type the text? To me, there is no "plotting tool" - there's just Scrivener! You have a text editor where you edit the individual documents that are going to be exported together as your finished manuscript, the Binder that shows the document tree (like Windows Explorer) and the Inspector, which shows metadata associated with individual documents. So yes, that's where you do all your work, if that's what you prefer.

Maybe I'm getting muddled up because I have looked at several different writing packages this week.
I was under the impression that there were lots of top level summaries (whether of character, chapter or scene) that effectively formed a plot outline. (These summaries being in the binder and in the inspector). Since that was the part of the software with lots of functionality, I was thinking of that as the plotting tool.
One then subsequently writes based on the summary stuff and uses the central text editing screen which has less functionality than all the binder/inspector part which holds the plot.

From what you are saying, the summaries are created as you write, rather than being created first to form a plot outline before you start to write the main manuscript.

Or have I totally lost the plot? Anyway, hope to find some time next week to do more on the tutorial and try out the work-arounds.


@Dozmonic
Thank you for posting that - looks very useful Not being funny, but I think you have a rather bigger computer monitor than I do - I have asked OH who has a bigger monitor if I can borrow his computer in a bit to read your post - scrolling the screen shot from side to side made it a bit hard to read. (Just to explain this is why I am not responding to your post at this point.....)

 

[Anne Lyle]

I was under the impression that there were lots of top level summaries (whether of character, chapter or scene) that effectively formed a plot outline. (These summaries being in the binder and in the inspector). Since that was the part of the software with lots of functionality, I was thinking of that as the plotting tool.

Ah, I see. I've been using Scrivener since before it came with document templates - it used to just have an empty "Research" folder where you could put any non-manuscript documents you wanted to store with the project. In any case, I tend to do my plot development with pen and paper

From what you are saying, the summaries are created as you write, rather than being created first to form a plot outline before you start to write the main manuscript.

No, that's not the case at all AFAIK. There is a program that will autofill metadata based on your text (maybe SuperNotecard? I used that before I discovered Scrivener), but I'm not sure Scrivener will do any of that.

What I did with the book I've been planning (book 3 of my trilogy) was to write the outline in the draft folder as a single big document, then break that up into scenes once I was happy with the flow of events. I need to move this text into the synopsis field, though, when I come to write each scene for real.

 

[Dozmonic]

I do run 1920x1080 and - much to the amusement of a lot of people - run most things in maximised windows. I'm told that since 1024x768 became an average rather than a top resolution, that people suddenly changed that habit and never told me

 

[Montero]

I've just got an elderly 16 inch CRT monitor. I used to have a lovely big 21 inch CRT (courtesy of freecycle) but it died .

Somewhere deep in the "storage garage" we have more CRT monitors (throw outs from a previous job) and when I have the time, and it isn't raining, I'm going to dig into there and will rig up my machine for dual screen so I can have plot outline on one and manuscript on the other. (Also finding a spare graphics card at the same time.)

 

[Montero]

Thanks Ann, that helps.

No, that's not the case at all AFAIK. There is a program that will autofill metadata based on your text (maybe SuperNotecard? I used that before I discovered Scrivener), but I'm not sure Scrivener will do any of that.

No, no, just meant that one is supposed to fill in cards and then write, not the autofill idea. That you are supposed to keep the cards up to date as you develop the story (with the thought it is easier to do that in one software package rather than needing to swap between). Sorry for not being clearer - (shouldn't have used passive voice ).
(I seriously wouldn't trust any computer to do autofill - shades of the bendy paperclip. "I see you are writing a letter" "XXX OFF" I think we are years off intelligent software that doesn't take longer to train than it does to do the job yourself.)

 

[Anne Lyle]

No, no, just meant that one is supposed to fill in cards and then write, not the autofill idea. That you are supposed to keep the cards up to date as you develop the story (with the thought it is easier to do that in one software package rather than needing to swap between).

Yes, it would make sense to update the synopsis field as you work. I am sadly too lazy to do that consistently

 

[Warren_Paul]

I've just got an elderly 16 inch CRT monitor. I used to have a lovely big 21 inch CRT (courtesy of freecycle) but it died .

Somewhere deep in the "storage garage" we have more CRT monitors (throw outs from a previous job) and when I have the time, and it isn't raining, I'm going to dig into there and will rig up my machine for dual screen so I can have plot outline on one and manuscript on the other. (Also finding a spare graphics card at the same time.)

CRTs? You mean there are still some of those in existence?

LCD monitors are really cheap these days, even LED ones. They are so much better for your eyes, and much clearer displays. CRT's terrible refresh rate - the flicker, the flicker! - is a major cause of eye strain.

Trust me, your eyes will love you for the upgrade.

 

[Vertigo]

I've just started playing with the evaluation copy of Scrivener and I have a couple of comments/questions.

When I brought in a couple of word documents written entirely in Verdana, the ' and " all got changed to Times New Roman and occasionally they doubled up in the process. I checked back in the original Word documents and the quotes in there are definitely Verdana and definitely not doubled up. Any thoughts on that. Have I done something silly? I had to fix it as otherwise any time I start typing right after one of those quotes it all comes out in Times New Roman. It wasn't too big a pain to fix but might have been if I'd had other passages in a different font.

The biggest drawback for me at present is that it only has a split screen letting you view two documents at a time. Although it calls this a really 'important' feature in the tutorial, it strikes me as being way out of date. Surely those two split screens should be unlimited floating windows. This is the one feature (or lack of it) that might stop me from using this software. Whilst I like many of it's other features I do like to have multiple documents open and viewable at the same time (I have two monitors so have a lot of screen space).

My normal* approach is to split the story into chapters/scenes using folders and separate documents for each scene. Scrivener manages that fine. Then I have other documents with character/location sketches in them. Scrivener also manages that fine. But... I typically want to have multiple scene documents open along with multiple character sketches. This it would appear Scrivener cannot do.

For me at least this is a big limitation and may be the stopper on me buying the software.



* considering how short a time I've been attempting to write that's probably not the best word

 

[Anne Lyle]

When I brought in a couple of word documents written entirely in Verdana, the ' and " all got changed to Times New Roman and occasionally they doubled up in the process. I checked back in the original Word documents and the quotes in there are definitely Verdana and definitely not doubled up. Any thoughts on that. Have I done something silly? I had to fix it as otherwise any time I start typing right after one of those quotes it all comes out in Times New Roman. It wasn't too big a pain to fix but might have been if I'd had other passages in a different font.

Sorry, I have no idea - sounds like a bug. You'd have to submit that one to the Scrivener forum on literatureandlatte.com

The biggest drawback for me at present is that it only has a split screen letting you view two documents at a time. Although it calls this a really 'important' feature in the tutorial, it strikes me as being way out of date. Surely those two split screens should be unlimited floating windows. This is the one feature (or lack of it) that might stop me from using this software. Whilst I like many of it's other features I do like to have multiple documents open and viewable at the same time (I have two monitors so have a lot of screen space).

My normal* approach is to split the story into chapters/scenes using folders and separate documents for each scene. Scrivener manages that fine. Then I have other documents with character/location sketches in them. Scrivener also manages that fine. But... I typically want to have multiple scene documents open along with multiple character sketches. This it would appear Scrivener cannot do.

Try the Quick Reference mode in the View menu - you can use that to open as many floating windows as you like

(Unfortunately it's not available by right-clicking on a document, which would be more convenient, but maybe you could request that feature for a future version.)

 

[kaal]

They look cool, unfortunately Scrivener isn't available on Linux & yWriter (while available) is hopelessly borked on Linux, so it looks like I'm sticking with vi & LibreOffice for now.

 

[Vertigo]

Sorry, I have no idea - sounds like a bug. You'd have to submit that one to the Scrivener forum on literatureandlatte.com

I shall maybe do that if I move forwards with it. I do like the compile features. Very useful.

Try the Quick Reference mode in the View menu - you can use that to open as many floating windows as you like

(Unfortunately it's not available by right-clicking on a document, which would be more convenient, but maybe you could request that feature for a future version.)

Hmmm I wonder if this is something they've done for Mac but not for Windows. On my version (only downloaded a couple of days ago, so should be the latest) there is no Quick Reference option in any of the menus. Searching the help manual for 'quick reference' also turns up nothing

As I said it is a bit of a pain and may well be a stopper on what does seem to be a very good program.

Maybe I should pop some questions up on their forums and see what I can find out.

 

[Anne Lyle]

They look cool, unfortunately Scrivener isn't available on Linux

It's in beta

http://www.literatureandlatte.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=33&sid=f3f4a91ce1523d048b58cf91b16d8ad9

There's also SuperNotecard, which is Java-based - I wrote the original "how to install on Linux" guide (now used on the SNC website) a few years ago, when I still had my EeePC:

https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/SuperNotecard/_EMJOpV3HFo

 

[Anne Lyle]

Hmmm I wonder if this is something they've done for Mac but not for Windows. On my version (only downloaded a couple of days ago, so should be the latest) there is no Quick Reference option in any of the menus. Searching the help manual for 'quick reference' also turns up nothing

Ah, could be - sorry about that. The Mac version has been around for about 5 years, so it tends to be ahead of the Windows version on features. There may be Windows features I don't know about, though, since I'm Mac-only.

 

[Vertigo]

Okay, Anne, well thanks anyway. I might have to ask on their forums. If it is on it's way then I can probably live with it for now. Being a just beginning aspiring writer (isn't that a great title!) I can certainly survive without it for the time being!

And kaal, VI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, you have to be kidding. With a gun at my head I used to use that for programming. But writing a book. Eeeeeeeeeeeek

 

[kaal]

It's in beta

Thanks. Just tried 1.1.0 and it segfaulted immediately. I'll try 1.2.1 when it appears.

There's also SuperNotecard, which is Java-based - I wrote the original "how to install on Linux" guide (now used on the SNC website) a few years ago, when I still had my EeePC:

Thanks, again. SNC on its own doesn't seem to offer a great deal over my homegrown tools (although I could probably replace a couple of timeline & cross-story threads spreadsheets with it). I'll give it a look, JIC.

And kaal, VI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, you have to be kidding. With a gun at my head I used to use that for programming. But writing a book. Eeeeeeeeeeeek

Yeah, vi. Been using it for 20 years. I can write faster in that than anything else (direct to html), but for editing drafts I import into Open/LibreOffice.

 

[Vertigo]

I used to use it programming Unix boxes back in '85 (shudder). Shifted to Emacs as soon as I could. I gather it has improved somewhat since those ancient days.

 

[Anne Lyle]

vim is great - I use it at work for writing Perl, HTML, CSS, etc. Wouldn't want to use it for fiction, though - I'm far too used to the organisational tools offered by a program like Scrivener.

Vertigo, I can't remember but have you tried Liquid Story Binder? It's quite similar to Scrivener, or so I'm told.

 

[kaal]

Can't get on with Emacs, always stayed with vi. Although there's now a "vim" "Vi IMproved", it's basically the same beast. One good thing about vim is that it "understands" C, shell, perl, HTML, etc., syntax. But it's really just the same for normal editing.
Thing is, to go along with editing in vi, I've had to write a few tools to give me book-style stats for the files. Hoping that I can retire those if I can get one of these other tools to work... They've had a good innings, almost 10 years thus far.

 

[Vertigo]

Anne, no not tried anything else. I only took a look at this as it seems quite well respected. I'm pretty organised with my files anyway and I'm not sure that I gain much there. However the ability to build all the files together with appropriate separators, chapters titles etc. does appeal. I can see that becoming a major paid with larger works.

Kaal: for me, back in those days, I loved Emacs because I could build it for almost any of the operating systems around which was an extraordinary level of compatability back then. However we shouldn't sidetrack with old reminiscences too much

 

[kaal]

Vertigo: D'accord.

While I'm waiting for the latest Scrivener to be out for linux 64bit, I've just realised that I have got Storybook installed... I suppose I should see if that's any good, really...

K