Michael Pless submitted a new resource: WriteItNow V5 - Software to aid with the planning and organization of a novel-length work Read more about this resource...
For those who have V5, or anyone trying to decide if it's for them or not, the manual is a free download, and is perhaps the best of its type I've ever encountered. To those with V5, it's a wonderful companion because it shows how to get the best out of the program. To those considering the program, it will demonstrate the depth of development this fine piece of software has received. And because WriteItNow is still in development, will continue to receive in years to come.
I'm new to WriteItNow V5, about a month of occasional use on a 10.11.3 Mac desktop. The good news is, what I know about the program I really like, with the bad news being it regularly freezes requiring shutdown and restarts. By freeze I mean the cursor in whatever I am doing stops functioning, however I am still able to save and close. When I reopen I can begin again with no loss of content. I can't detect a repeatable pattern when it freezes. I can be in a chapter or developing a character or event and things just stop. I've reinstalled the program, I've tried with no other programs or browsers open, but no luck. I've also sent my content file to the program developer to see if he could duplicate the issue. He couldn't which suggests there is a conflict within my system that is causing the problem. The program creator has been great attempting to help me sort this out. He's even refunded my money. He says, and I believe him, that he knows of no one else who has this issue. My last hope before looking for an alternative is to ask here whether anyone has had similar issues, and if so, did you find a solution? Note to anyone considering WriteItNow. My problems notwithstanding, I strongly encourage you to buy this program. I'm convinced my problem is unique to maybe just me. The program is as good as the reviews and users say and well worth your money.
awesome, it looks like it will export for self publishing on google play and kindle. have just downloaded it and am looking forward to trying it out!
WIN runs in Java, regardless of platform. Is there a chance your Java installation needs updating? Rob has probably got you to look into this already, but it's worth asking the question. I run mine in a windows VirtualBox in Linux and it has never fallen over or misbehaved. I've even had it run fine in a WINE installation on Linux, and the only issue was the spell-check dictionary wouldn't update with user-added words. I'm sorry I can't be more help because I am not an Apple user.
My wife purchased this for me last week. I have been playing around ever since and find it outstanding in regards to having a very detailed outline for your story. Wish I had it sooner. Scrivener was just not my cup of tea, it wasn't as organized in my opinion. WiN5 is just right up my alley. I like how you can plan events and create locations that can be added to any chapter or scene. The timeline it creates if really helpful also. Character creation is simple and I really enjoy how you can chart out relationships between characters. Reminds me a little of a more complex flow chart diagram. The scene editor creates a great visual of who, what, where, and when things are taking place in your chapters. I have had the most fun with this feature. It really lines up everything for you and sets up an outline that will keep you on a logical track. It doesn't write the story for you, but its outlining features sure work better than random notes all over the place on my computer and writing notebooks. One of the best gifts the wife has given me. Now I have to be nice to her the rest of this year, she earned it. She knows nothing about writing or software for writing. She just picked it because she thought it looked cool.
I think you're referring to the "Scene Summary" - if so, there is also an equivalent for the chapters. I suggested this to Rob, the program creator, during the last beta testing and he put it into V5. If you don't like the default template, then you can customize it and use your own. Don't miss out on David Lovelock's downloadable (from the help menu) Guide - it's a terrific piece of work and very useful.
I have a question (I love the program, as well). I cannot find how to indent an entire paragraph. For example I want to embed a quote in the storyline with the entire quote indented. How do I do that?
I don't think you can. Formatting in WIN is very basic - it isn't intended to be a wordprocessor - and an annoyance to me is that when a paragraph is indented, WIN does it by adding leading spaces. On export they are removed.
There is no info on the cost of a license... am I missing it? Download is free but saving requires a lic from what I read. Any pointers?
There's a link labeled "Price" right on the home page – it's $60 for an unlock code, $70 for a shipped CD.
Java apps never ran too well on Mac... Besides, there were always two different releases – one from Apple, one from Oracle – and the Apple one is goner. Apple doesn't support it anymore. But you can still download it somewhere. But the better, still maintained choice, is a runtime from Oracle, but even so, as I said, a lot of Java Apps don't do so well. On top of that there are multiple different runtime environments which are still maintained, which are needed for backwards compatibility of older apps. It's a rather confusing mess. (You install an older runtime, and the app runs, but badly, because of the runtime version. The App would also run with a newer environment, but i'm not quite sure if you can install different environments, say, if you need them for different apps, or if apps would automatically trigger to run in the correct one.) For me personally, a Java App gets a bit "Con" rating and needs to have a lot of Pros to be used...
Thanks! I didn't go to the site. The others had pricing as part of the posting. Not a bad price if it helps productivity. Has anyone used MS Word for novels? Any templates? I'm using Word now and prefer to continue rather than spend more money.
Define 'continue'... Both Scrivener and WriteItNow can import Word files. I dunno how well it works with WIN (I never used that), but with Scrivener it works rather well [Caveat: The files I tried were not very complex and small, about 4 pages of mostly plain text, with one additional paragraph style for chapter headings, and two character styles for emphasizing.] Both have (or rather, I KNOW Scrivener has, and WIN says it has, see above) functions to make the manuscript more handy for their workflow, say, by automatically splitting into chapters using certain (chosable) markers in the Word doc. (From what I fast-read on their webpage, WIN seems to have a more complete tool for that than Scrivener, or at least a dialog window with chock full of options.) Even if you do not (want to) use the tools Scrivener or WIN offer, you can just import and type away more text lickety-split; the basic editor functions do not vary much between Word and the others. You can learn the added functionality along the way.
I use MS Word for novels. It copes with 100,000 word files with ease, and has some excellent features including, if you're a big planner, outlining. I have been using it for years and am so familiar with it that it's more comfortable than my slippers and there are very few times when I think if only Word had feature X I could write a better novel... That said, I do write a few custom macros, a couple I posted in here that take you straigh to google/dictionary/thesaurus from a highlighted word or section, and one which I haven't (it's work in progress and quite slow) which builds a list of over-used words, these might be out of the box with other packages? One thing that I would recommend if you are a fairly basic Word user is that you familiarise yourself with styles and use them. Having, for example, a style called "chapter heading" and using it for your headings rather than formatting them as you go will save you a world of pain later on.
Ha! I fully understand that technology can't enhance my meager writing skills. Have seen many examples of that over the years. I definitely use the styles feature in Word as well as others. I have to lessons of many failed documents to aid my skills. Some of those as far back as 1985 using the older word processing apps. In some cases Word is too sophisticated and attempts to mangle spelling and formatting to my dismay. Thanks for the input!
Thanks Martin. My "continue" referred to the use of Word as my primary tool to regurgitate my story. Seeing it in my mind and conveying it in words has never been my forte as you saw from my post above. That's why I landed on this site. Perhaps this old fart can learn through critiquing others and receiving learned input in return.
Thread drift, but you will learn as much, if not more, through critiquing the work of others as you will from having your own work critiqued! Both are important, but the further you go down this road the more you start to "read like a writer" - which is different.
For the stuff I want to write, I need to keep copious notes. About characters, places, storylines. I'm also an extremely non-linear writer. I often write stuff not knowing where it will end up, or at all in this particular story. So I need to be able to quickly glance, or keep notes, where I wrote what. Sure I could use a 'normal' word processor like Word, but I would have to organize a lot around it with other tools. Scrivener (and WIN, and a handful of others) help with that, keeping everything in one place, and saving a workplace with multiple other stuff in one convenient location. I would have to do MORE besides writing (or creating a character, or location, or world, which is all part of it) if I stuck with a simple word processor – namely organizing. Scrivener does this for me. Traditional word processor are too much focused on HOW the words look like, not how they go together to form a story. And some Scrivener templates were extremely helpful for me. In particular those which are not manuscript templates, but background info templates. But, use whatever flows your boat. For me it's Scrivener, others like Word. Or just pen and paper. Whatever you're using, if you write, you're a writer. But if you feel you have trouble based on the tools, try other tools. Pretty much everything has trial versions.
I got hold of WriteItNow a few months ago. So far I have used it as a supplementary tool to Word, as I have already done most of the work on a couple of texts. I use it to map my story and characters, and it is really great. But having tried it on two different manuscripts - both times the program starts giving me trouble after a while. It simply gets incredibly slow - takes forever to change between characters or Chapters, or basically do anything. Is this a well known issue?
I was using version 4 for years. I recently discovered version 5 and upgraded. I have no regrets I'm madly in love with this program because I have tried many but none worked for me as good as this program. It helps me keep everything so well organized.
