Storyist's Use Of Styles

[Steve E]

Most word processors use invisible tags to identify special text like chapter headings or sections. Storyist seem to identify them with formatting alone. That is, text can have a Chapter Style or a Section Style, which alone seems to make it a chapter or a section with the properties thereof. In Storyist such properties include appearing on the Project Pane and linking to data Sheets.

 

Were I to decide that I didn't like the font I was using and did a Select All and tried to change the font, I would (and do) get a message that this would delete Sheets. I imagine this is because globally changing the font of a manuscript changes Chapter and Section fonts as well, rendering them unable to be identified as Chapters and Sections. Therefore they lose their linking ability. I presume this is not a bug but the intended methodology.

 

Similarly, attempting to remove spacing above or below a Section or Chapter without using Edit Style would also cause Storyist some confusion. (It has for me. See my Forum Bug entry on disappearing Sections.)

 

If I got any of this right, and I certainly might not, it would seem to complicate certain basic functions (like global changes to styles within the manuscript). The advantages and limitations of this "Style Flag" approach should be spelled out to the user. So should any work-around. (And please don't let it be "select each Section and change it one at a time.)

 

Also:

 

If there's an Inside Storyist book planned to explain the nuts and bolts (like Storyist's use of Styles) I'd like to get on the pre-order list. Short of that, I think appropriate additions to the Help file are in order. Short of that, how about a tutorial in Forum? Too much?

[Steve]

Thoth,

 

Thanks for starting the thread.

 

Storyist does use style information to build the project outline--specifically the style's "Outline Level" attribute. This is the approach used by many other word processors, including Word and Open Office. Word, for example, uses "Heading 1", "Heading 2", "Heading 3" etc to determine where the heading goes in the outline view or table of contents. If you examine these styles, you'll see that each style has an "Outline Level" paragraph attribute that specifies the outline level. Same with Storyist.

 

Due to the special requirements of novel manuscripts and screenplays, Storyist also provides a way to identify separate blocks of body text (i.e. sections and scenes) so that they appear in the outline. This works as follows:

 

In novel manuscripts, Storyist recognizes the special "Section Title" style as the start of a block of body text and the section separator (a paragraph containing only the "#" character) as the end of a block of body text. Only one is required, but the section separator is preferred, since you will probably want to select Format > Manuscript > Hide Section Titles when you send your manuscript off to your agent or editor.

 

In screenplays, Storyist recognizes the special "Scene Heading" style as the start of a scene.

 

In addition to presenting the sections or scenes in the project outline (and possibly a table of contents in the future), Storyist uses the outline level information to keep track of your section or scene sheets. And since there is currently no visual feedback that you have section sheets attached to a section, Storyist will warn you if you make edits that would result in the merging of sections and, as a result, the loss of your notes.

 

Note: You mention that you received the warning when trying to change the documents fonts. Storyist is being a bit overzealous here--changing the font has no effect on the outline. I'll fix that. In the mean time, as a work around, you can change the style definition to use the font you desire--you don't have to edit each section individually