[HN Gopher] Interview with Keith Blount, Creator of Scrivener ___________________________________________________________________ Interview with Keith Blount, Creator of Scrivener Author : cocacola1 Score : 29 points Date : 2022-11-26 20:09 UTC (2 hours ago) (HTM) web link (syntopikon.substack.com) (TXT) w3m dump (syntopikon.substack.com) | CrypticShift wrote: | I used Scrivener more like a generic [Outliner + DB] combo than a | tool for long form writing. | | IMO combining outlining and databases could be powerful if fully | exploited (research...). | | I truly consider Keith Blount to be a "hero" in the sense that he | offered this power for all writers out there (at a reasonable | price.) | | --- | | FYI, Other outliner+DB beasts include the " _overlooked for way | too long_ " Infoqube [0] and the " _probably soon to be a rising | star_ " Tana [1]. | | [0] https://www.infoqube.biz/ | | [1] https://tana.inc/ | rcarr wrote: | I switched from Scrivener to a two app approach: Obsidian for all | of my own writing, DevonThink for all research materials. I love | having this distinction and find both my mind and workspaces feel | less cluttered as a result. I also like that all my writing is | completely portable. I can link between the two apps using either | app URLs or using Hookmark but I haven't used this much yet. If I | needed timelines for a particular project I'd buy a copy of Aeon. | I used to have a version on an old machine but it's since been | updated and I haven't worked on anything that needed it yet | although I imagine I will do at some point. | | Should also add that I do have a soft spot and gratitude for | Scrivener as, coming from Word, it was the first software that I | used that allowed you to organise all your notes together in | folders and contained other cool tools for writers such as the | built in name generator (which I still use), the corkbord | organiser etc. Scapple (made by the same company) is also great | if you want to do some quick mind mapping and integrates really | well with Scrivener as you can import all the bubbles and get to | work fleshing them out. | ghaff wrote: | I should take a look at DevonThink (and maybe Obsidian though | I'm mostly fine with Google Docs). I own Scrivener and have | used it. But I don't find it ideal for research materials and, | for the non-fiction writing I do, I don't find functional flow | all that complicated. And then I'm going to have to transfer it | to a different tool at some point anyway. | | Scrivener seems like it's good at solving problems I mostly | don't feel I have. | rcarr wrote: | Once you get it set up how you want it, DevonThink absolutely | rocks and it's perfect for non-fiction research. It's got a | 100 hour free trial so worth testing it out. I'd recommend | downloading the manual and/or the Take Control Of DevonThink | book from the devontechnologies website (both free) and | giving both a speed read so you get an idea of some of the | stuff it can do. | | Obviously depends on your own individual workflow but here | are some of my recommendations: | | Make sure you get the iOS companion app DevonThink To Go. | This allows you to capture everything on your mobile devices. | Also make sure you install all add ons via DevonThink3 -> | Install Add Ons. | | These add ons will: | | - Allow you to view and import emails in DevonThink (you will | also have to enable the plugin in the Apple Mail app for this | functionality to work) | | - Put an 'Inbox' folder in your finder which allows you to | just drag any file or folder into it and have it appear in | your DevonThink Inbox | | - Give you OCR for all your pdfs | | - Give you extensions for browsers to clip things easily. | | When you clip something that you want to read or refer back | to you're generally best off using the 'paginated PDF' | setting as not all the available options support annotation | and the AI search. It's not a big deal if you don't because | you can just right click something and click 'Convert To' to | turn it into a pdf later. | | Two settings I'd recommend trying out: | | DevonThink3 -> Preferences -> General -> Interface -> Retain | View (On) | | Stops the view from changing every time you switch databases | which can be annoying. | | DevonThink3 -> Preferences -> General -> Interface -> Unify | Inboxes (Off) | | Moves each databases inbox into the database itself which | makes it a lot easier for when you're filing things. | | Four Shortcuts I Find Useful: | | Cmd-Ctrl-M - brings up a panel for moving a file quickly | | Cmd-7 for wide screen view (makes more sense than the | standard view) | | Cmd-option-i - toggle right inspector | | Cmd-option-1 - toggle left sidebar | AlbertCory wrote: | I used Scrivener for a while. I switched to Vellum, which I like | much better. | | What was the decider? I wanted to have "drop caps", that cool | feature where the first letter of a chapter is 3 or 4 lines big. | The forums for Scrivener suggested some very complicated ways to | do it involving CSS. In Vellum it's just one of the styles. | Silly, but it's my book and I wanted it. | | Vellum also seems to know publishing conventions better (the | half-title page, the copyright page, About the Author, etc.) They | make your book not look so self-published. | | I'm not trashing Scrivener, though. It's a good product. | jacques-noris wrote: | Strange comparison. Scrivener is for writing books, Vellum for | publishing, even if scrivener has a publish option. But they | rather complement each other. Scrivener is incredible value for | money. | TheOtherHobbes wrote: | I recently wasted three days trying to get Scrivener to do | something very basic - autonumber sections in a book without | including part numbers. | | It should have been easy, but the autonumbering features | didn't work as advertised and I ended up with something that | is probably a hack that relies on some bugs. | | It's good VFM, but considering its audience it's also one of | the most user-hostile pieces of software I've ever used. [1] | | There's _far_ too much "Yes it does that but it's not | designed for it so keep your expectations low" for comfort. | | Either include features and make them professional, or don't | include them at all. I'd happily pay two or three times as | much for something that does all the things it sorta kinda | implies it does but you know actually not really. | | Vellum does almost nothing in comparison except produce a | limited range of beautiful books. But perhaps that may be of | some interest to writers? | | [1] TBF it's far better than Calibre. But that has the excuse | of being free. | AlbertCory wrote: | Kinda my feeling. But I won't trash Scrivener. | | > Vellum does almost nothing in comparison except produce a | limited range of beautiful books. | | Exactly. That's all I want. Hopefully a higher price means | they can live on that alone. | | And they have fonts which not everyone in the world is | using. Maybe Scrivener does too; haven't checked. | | But maybe _this_ will start a flame war: Guy Kawasaki | recommends Adobe InDesign. To hell with monthly fees, so | no. | AlbertCory wrote: | "writing books" vs. "publishing" ? Is that a sharp | distinction? | Rygian wrote: | It's usually done by different people with different job | descriptions. | | A writer's output are manuscripts, works of art. | | A publisher's output is a commercial offering of books, a | business. | | [1] https://askanydifference.com/difference-between-author- | and-p... | MrVandemar wrote: | I agree, but the latter can _also_ be a work of art. | Typesetting is definitely something that can be done | right or wrong, and sometimes to a breathtakingly high | standard. | least wrote: | Scriveners tools are designed to help a person write like | keeping track of timelines, character sheets, and the like. | | It sounds like the other product has tools for typesetting | and layout, which are tools for publishing your finished | work. | cocacola1 wrote: | I only tried the trial of Vellum but, from what I remember, it | was easy to use and beautiful to boot. Definitely a lot less | complicated than Scrivener (which, if your goal is to write a | book, is probably the way to go). It seems like a joy to work | in for the long haul. | | The thing for me is price. Vellum is $200-250, Scrivener is $60 | (I got it for ~$40 with NaNoWriMo discounts a few years ago, if | I recall correctly). Plus you can write screenplays in it, | which was another bonus. I have spent more time than I should | customizing it, but that ended up being part of the joy. I've | more than a million words in it so it's unlikely I'll switch, | but it's a joy to use. | AlbertCory wrote: | I actually think the higher price is an asset, not a | liability (unless you can't afford it, of course). It means | they have a business model that doesn't require a huge mass | market to survive, so they won't go broke or get acquired and | watered down by some big company. | cocacola1 wrote: | I'd agree with that. I certainly hope they're able to stay | in business - it seems as though Vellum takes care of | everything. About the only thing it can't do (I might be | wrong) is that it can't output to Word format? I'm the | process of publishing a book right now and they've | requested everything in Word. | | Edit: Turns out that as of ~10 days ago, you can, in fact, | export to Word (https://blog.vellum.pub/) in Vellum. | AlbertCory wrote: | I just looked: you can export to RTF. So couldn't Word | import that? | cocacola1 wrote: | I was wrong. Just took a look at their blog and | apparently as of 3.4 (Nov. 16, 2022) you can export to | Word (https://blog.vellum.pub/). That's excellent. | rcarr wrote: | If you're interested in screenplays you might be interested | in the fountain file format. It's like markdown but for | screenplays. It allows you to write screenplays in any text | editor and I really like the simplicity of it keeps me | focussed on the task at hand. There's a very cool app created | by screenwriter John August (Big Fish, Charlie and The | Chocolate Factory) called Highlander2 on the Mac App Store | that is purpose built for it (technically it uses a custom | file format called highland but it's basically just a folder | with a fountain file inside it and a few other files for | editor settings, metadata and handling images if you have | any). There's also fountain extensions for VS Code, Sublime | Text, Obsidian and probably other editors out there I don't | know of. | | Links: | | https://fountain.io/ | | https://highland2.app/index.php | vore wrote: | I think Scrivener also has different goals: Vellum looks like | it's intended for publishing, but Scrivener I think of more as | an organizational tool. That said, I've been using Dabble if | only because it's all cloud-based and I don't have to worry | about syncing files around myself. | [deleted] | dinkleberg wrote: | Vellum looks excellent, thanks for mentioning it. | thenerdhead wrote: | Scrivener is amazing on macOS. | | I tried doing the cross-platform writing story with the new | versions on Windows and mobile apps, but it just has too many | issues of syncing and random formatting bugs across the OS. | | I absolutely love the mac experience though and it has helped me | author two books in less than two years. I've tried markdown | generators and traditional word, but Scrivener just feels right. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-11-26 23:00 UTC)