Thanks for the the reply KB, So, Scrivener understands the docx file right? However I imported from a docx file but the resulting tables are not equivalent and trying to fix it seems impossible. There are quite a few problems, another one for example is the borders are not redrawing properly, After typing something inside a cell the format would screw up and some of the borders are missing. When I clicked away to display another file/page and then click back the borders would be re-drawn properly.
Does anyone have a solution or a hack to get a template page… strictly speaking, a form with tables, to import properly into S? Would more experienced users recommend the idea of completely re-creating these forms from scratch in S?
Honestly, if you are trying to create what is essentially a large spreadsheet I would recommend creating it in a dedicated spreadsheet tool.
But what’s the ultimate goal here? If you want to extract specific details from a collection of imported papers and collect them in a single table, you might consider using Scrivener’s metadata and custom metadata fields to store the information, and Scrivener’s Outline view to review it. See Section 10.4 in the manual for more information about metadata, and Section 8.3 for more information about Outline view.
Thanks Katherine. I have a Mac, so spreadsheet and word processor is not the tool. I already have those. The goal is to collect (and I use Zotero for this), view and organise (with ease and flexibility) multiple pieces of information in the one place. I think I can do this with S. I was hoping I could also take the final step of documenting or presenting them from within S. The presentation part is a fillable Form of sort, not my own creation, not a spreadsheet, it has normal sentence/paragraph text but containing two or more tables per page. I should add that these are simple tables, between 2 to 5 or so columns with multiple rows. Text within the cells are maybe of 3 or 4 types (heading, subheading, basic text, sometimes italicised).
Nevermind, as of 2020 version it looks like Scrivener still has very limited table handling capability, so I will go back to using Pages for the final step. At least it will replace Apple Notes.
Using scrivener to write, I sill have one issue with table. Could be cool if UX Table is better but also,the following option.
Sadly, table take 100% of the page and not render verry well when you have a lot of column. Coud be cool to have a fixed len even if it’s bigger than the page.
I love Scrivener, a lot. But I am running into some issues with tables. I don’t use a lot of tables, or what I do use, I put in either Sheets or in LibreOffice Calc or Excel. I use Scrivener for my novel notes and sometimes, I just need a simple two column format to organize information, like a quick character list with name and then a brief description. Since there isn’t a column function in the editor itself, I tried to do a table. I created the table first and then attempted to copy/paste, but that did not work as it copy/pasted them all into one cell.
I then got rid of the table and copy/pasted. It all copy/pasted perfectly or so it seemed, but once I closed out and then went back in, the table dimensions had changed to the point where the second column had shrunk to nothing.
Apologies for that more long-winded explanation, but I suppose my wish is that tables or columns could have slightly better functionality. Or perhaps having a list function (not sure how it would be implemented) of some sort? Like I said, this is mostly for lists or things that need a second column.
I’ve been using Scrivener for years and this is just one of those things I keep running up against every so often. Thank you so much for this wonderful tool!
A working process would be to create a Table with two 50% width columns and as many rows as you need. Then Copy each Cell contents into the cell you want it in. Don’t copy/paste the entire Table.
Alternatively, if using LibreOffice, create the table in the word processor component of the app and copy and paste the entire table where you’d like it in a Scrivener document.
I’ve done this with a Word table, and it still functions as a table in Scrivener, in that you can add columns and rows, etc. – limited but still manageable.
If you still want to use Excel, then copy your table to Word, it will render as a table in Word that you can adjust things like column width and then copy the Word table and paste it as is into Scrivener.