Adding subsection

Scrivener Newcomer Central
1

Hi
How can I add a subsection to an existed section?

2

Hi.
By “section”, do you mean a formatting related section type
or a document in the binder (left of editor) ?

→ Documents in the binder are nested in parent documents or folders (any document can be a parent), and can be moved by drag and drop. Or by Ctrl + left\right\up\down arrows.

Section types don’t have subsections.

3

sorry I wasn’t clear enugh. I meant adding subsection in the binder

4

Ctrl + n
Then drag and drop to desired parent.

P.S. The term used here is “document”.

5

sorry again. but I don’t know what do you mean by parent. Anyway I should have said that I am talking about subsection in new level.

6

Create a new document (Ctrl+n)
Drag and drop it on top of any other document.
You’ll see what I mean. :wink:

A few terms :
The container document = parent
The nested document = child
Same level documents = siblings (when grouped under the same parent doc. ) → Level 3 docs across the binder, for e.g., are not systematically siblings to one another.

8

but the new document is the same level as the one above it. What I meant is adding subsection (child) subordinate to or part of another document which shown in the binder inclined to the right.

9

Exactly.
Try again ; make sure you drop it on top of the other one. (Sometimes it is hard – an OS thing.)

Or use Ctrl + >

Then, if it “disappears”, look for the down arrow left side of the visible document.

1 Like
10

oh my God I never thought that it’s as easy as that! Vincent you are the best. Thank you brother

1 Like
11

The way I usually create new child items to the section I’m currently working on is to do it right in the editor, rather than switching over to the binder:

  1. Press Ctrl+2 to switch to corkboard. At this point, if I am writing in a regular text item then the corkboard will be empty.
  2. Press Return to make the new section and name it. Having done that, take a look at the binder. Our current section will have switched icons to the “stack of paper” icon, indicating subsections beneath it.

So there are two methods of returning to writing at this point:

  • Press Ctrl+1 / ⌘1 to switch the view mode to Scrivenings, with the selected card scrolled to. This approach works great if you want to continue working at the section level essentially, where subsections (and potentially deeper) are integrated in a single scroll view.
  • Press the shortcut for Navigate ▸ Open ▸ in Editor. The much simpler Spacebar to load selected item should work here, but alas, the Windows programmers haven’t added a setting for that yet.

And of course, once you have a nested item and are working within it, from the editor you can always hit Ctrl+N / ⌘N to create a new sibling subsection. If you’re in Scrivenings mode, it stays that way and adds the new section right into the session. So all of the above is really only something one does initially, to transition from the current level into deeper levels that don’t exist yet.

I don’t know if mechanically there is any great advantage to working this way over the binder—but I find it generally useful because I’m often not using the binder to focus on what I’m currently working on, if that makes sense. The binder may not even be visibly showing where I am, because of collapsed folders, or scrolled to something else entirely. I often arrive at text in the editor through other means, like links/bookmarks, Quick Search, history, or similar navigation techniques demonstrated above. I tend to stay in the editor for long periods of time, so for me, a technique that makes sole use of the editor is what works best.

At any rate, learning the relationship between group view modes like Corkboard, Outliner and Scrivenings will make your life easier going forward. View modes look “downward” from what you navigated to initially, which means that by definition, creating new items within them creates child items.

1 Like