Google Docs import/export

Scrivener Wish List
1

Hi,

First of, thanks a lot for making Scrivener, it is by far the best writing tool out there and I love writing in it. Getting feedback on that writing however, goes better in Google Docs. Many people use Google Docs for this purpose, in fact, it’s encouraged in many writing groups online (reddit.com/r/fantasywriters for example).

The benefit is people can highlight text online and leave comments on specific sections. It is easiest to just change them directly in the Google Doc and then ‘resolve’ the comments as you go. But then your Scrivener version is no longer up to date with the version in Google Docs. If the document is finished at that point, that’s fine. If it’s just one chapter of a novel you’re writing, you want to keep everything up to date in Scrivener too.

So my wish is for the following:

Export gains a new option: Google Drive
The selected scene(s) are exported to Google Drive and Scrivener knows it has done this.
If changes are made to the exported scenes, those scenes will have the option to “merge changes from Google Drive” where any editing that has been done there will be merged back into the Scrivener version.

Currently the whole thing is rather cumbersome (e.g. export a scene to RTF, save it on the Google Drive, convert it to gdoc so people can leave the comments in it, then either apply the changes by hand in the scrivener version OR save the gdoc as RTF again, import it back into Scrivener and fix any formatting stuff that might differ from the rest of the project).

Why not simply copy & paste? Well, because I seem to lose formatting information when I do (paragraph styling, italics, etc. I run OS X Mountain Lion and use the latest Firefox).

2

I’ve never tried this kind of writing process; if it works for you, fine.
Personally, I can’t stand too many cooks hovering over my soup pot.

You may be best off writing first in Google Docs,
And when you finally have satisfied the editing group,
Put those units into Scrivener for your solitary revision and polishing.

My own use of GD is post-Scrivener, to share files with a collaborator.
When we are mostly working on consistency of format and style.
Or letting an agent or editor take an early peek.

I doubt there’s any easy way to make Scriv and Docs synchronous.
But good luck on your efforts, and HNY.