I’ve set up my custom meta-data (POV, Setting, Time, etc.), however, when I’m filling in their text boxes in Outliner, I’m not able to use the Return key for a line break within the textbox. If I do, it takes me out of the textbox altogether.
The reason I want line breaks is to list more than one time within the same textbox (for a single chapter), so it will take up less room across the horizontal line of meta-data, which holds the various information I want to see all at once.
Maybe it’s a simple answer: textboxes cannot be re-formatted in this way. If this is so, I suspect that it’s time for me to break my chapters into separate scenes which would solve the list of different times within one box.
Ann, two things:
(1) I don’t actually use the outliner or synopses, but I think you can either (i) use Alt-Return to put a line break within the synopsis, and presumably in the editor for custom meta-data, or (ii) I believe if you look carefully in the Scrivener Preferences, there is a toggle that makes it possible to enter returns into text boxes like the synopses;
(2) Splitting chapters up into smaller sections—scenes or whatever—has other benefits, in terms of moving them around if necessary, being able to link more closely to some text—Scrivener links only work to documents, not to text within those documents—marking with keywords, etc. And you can always use Scrivenings mode to view them as if they were a single document, with the slight difference of little angle-brackets in the margins indicating document boundaries.
I’m sure someone more knowledgeable in these areas will come along soon, but I hope that gives you some ideas about how to go about resolving your issue.
Mark,
You are right about the alt-return keys creating a line break!! Hooray! I did come across the toggle in Preferences and it didn’t seem to work for the meta-data.
I am going to begin to break my draft into scenes; I can see many benefits.
Thank you for you help!
Ann