Inline annotation

[chrised]

I've just bought Storyist and I'm coming from a background with Scrivener - is there an equivalent of the inline annotations that Scrivener has? I could use text styles but I'd prefer something where the annotations don't get exported, only the normal text does.

[marguerite]

Hi, chrised, and welcome to the forums,

You can use comments. Click in the text where you want the comment to be, then go to the Edit menu, choose Insert, then Comment. You will see a little yellow sticky note where you can type your comment.

 

If you click on the four squares at top right to get storyboard view (here, the collage, because it is one section with a gray background), you will see an index card representing the scene in the text and the yellow sticky containing your comment. Click on the icon that looks like a sheet of paper with a folded corner to get back to text view.

Best,

Marguerite

[Fitch]

Hi Marguerite,

 

I did what you suggested, and it worked exactly as predicted, as usual. But I also learned that if I want to see a yellow reminder in the text that there is a comment, I need to click in the manuscript window to make it active, then go to View>Show Comments and click on it. Then I get a little yellow reminder that there is a comment there. If I click on the reminder I see the whole comment appear.

 

Near as I can tell, there is no option to show comments in outline mode. With the split view I can see the comment in the manuscript, but as soon as I click in the outline that goes back to the little reminder. I wonder if anybody has asked to be able to see comments while in outline mode? I realize they are there in collage mode but that's not the same thing. I'd like to be able to see the comments while I work on major revisions that require outlining to lay them out.

 

Fitch

[chrised]

OK, got it. Thanks for the replies.

 

In this case, comments alone don't quite do the job. I tend to use comments for references and "why is this here?" sort of commentary, whereas the Scrivener inline annotations are very handy for placeholder text as in "this copy is rubbish, fix this first" or "there is more detail that should go here".

 

I can use Markdown-style workarounds for this, which is what I've used in other editors (as they're easy to strip out in a hurry with macros), but it would be good at some point to have the ability to have a choice of comments/annotations that go inline and others that can go into virtual stickies.

[marguerite]

Hi, Fitch,

You could split the screen and display the same text in two ways: outline in the main window where you are working and collage on the right so you can see the comment.

 

Thoth is our big comments guy, but he hasn't posted in a while and still uses an older version of the software. I actually don't use comments much: I stick in bookmarks to mark things I know I want to change (or just where I stopped working on the MS, in case I click away for some reason), but I either keep suggested revisions in a note or enter them right into the text . And I use plot points to outline things if needed, displayed as index cards or an outline, not the manuscript itself. So I can't be too helpful in that regard.

 

I don't remember any feature request for comments showing in the outline. But what shows in the outline is not the text itself but whatever is on the index card for the text, which does not include comments anyway. You could try displaying your manuscript as text in one window and as cards in another and writing your comments directly onto the index cards. Then you would see that text in the outline when you switched to outline mode.

Hope that helps.

Best,

M

[marguerite]

chrised,

Maybe you could use a combination of bookmarks and comments: one for "fix this first" and the other for "why is this here?" type questions.

 

If you click on the gear menu in the collage, you can also set the color of the index cards. Some people find this helpful for marking cards that need work.

Best,

M