linking outline entries to a document

Scrivener Scrivener for Windows
1

Hi,

The way I work is to outline first, then write second and iterate from then on, sometimes chaotically.

What I would love to do may be available, although I could not find instructions on how to do it in the manual.

What I would like to do is copy a Binder Outline entry and then paste ITS LINK into the Document.
What that means, is, the paste command does not paste the copied text. The paste command installs an invisible link in the document that points to the “copied text”. The link is not seen. The copied text appears to be there in the document but in fact is a reference to text elsewhere.

That way, if i modify the Binder outline entry, the document entry changes. It would be nice if the process were symmetrical; if I change the link in the document, the Binder outline entry will change.

MS word calls the first part of the above paragraph a “special paste” or something like that. I use that feature extensively. I don’t think MS word can do the latter part of the above paragraph

Is the feature available? If not, is the feature being considered for a future edition of Scrivener? Maybe people who write extensively find they do not need this possible feature as their outline is succinct.

I look forward to hearing if other people would find this feature helpful, and if not, then please share how they cope with making changes in both outline and document

2

I’m not sure if I understand you correctly. If by “Binder outline entry” you are refering to document titles, and by links you mean document references, then these are my 2 cents:

(I’m not an expert, but this is what I’ve found out using Scriver Win/Mac so far).

As of now, only in the Mac version a reverse link is automatically created when inserting a reference to another document. On Windows, you have to create the reverse link manually. As with any Mac feature, this is on the Windows version pipeline too.

As of now, changing the document title does not update the references on neither Windows nor Mac. I’ve seen some debate on the matter but I’m not sure if this is on the “accepted” features to add to either version. I personally would vote definitely yes.

I hope this helps!

3

I’m not sure if I understand you correctly. If by “Binder outline entry” you are refering to document titles, and by links you mean document references, then these are my 2 cents:

Thank you for responding. I am not sure of nomenclature, yet so please be patient with me.
What I got from your comment was that each entry in the Binder is a Document
Title.

your comment suddenly made me pay attention to the Title on the window containing the document associated with the Binder Entry. I apologize for missing that simple connection.

The Title in the document window IS linked to the outline !!! I totally missed it. That is good enough. It solves my problem

I had visualized printing the document and was not sure I would be able to connect parts of the printed document to the outline so I typed the Binder Titles into the document. Not necessary now I understand Titles and documents and Binder relationships. I remember in formatting being able to chose Title…and that takes care of my printing concern.

I would love to understand what you thought i meant by “references”. But I suspect that I need to play a bit more with this application before I ask. to me, all references are pointers (in programming parlance) or links (in html).

Thank you, once again, for your generous time. You DID help me.

4

I’m not following precisely what it is you are going for. Would you basically describe this as dynamically included text? As a basic example, say I have two files with these contents:

File A
Here is some text.
File B
An introduction.
Here is some text.

Where in File B, the green text is actually the content of File A, and changes made to either all just point back to the same internal resource? If so, no, Scrivener doesn’t have anything like that and probably never will—that seems like a rather risky approach to me (both technologically and from a user-friendliness standpoint).

But, if all you want is the ability to link from one document to another so that you can click something and be sent there, or open that document in the split view, then we do have quite a lot of support for that. You’ll want to check out §9.4 Linking Documents Together in the user manual PDF (pg. 80 on).

For example, it is very easy to hold down Alt and drag an item into the text editor to create a hyperlink—or off in the Document Notes sidebar. While on the sidebar, there are of course also References, which can hold internal links between sections, as well as regular file links and URLs.

In addition to the Alt-drag method, you can also do something similar to this by selecting the item(s) you wish to create hyperlinks to and using the Edit/Copy Special menu. It’s just flipped around from the way Word does it, I suppose.

Speaking for myself, my outlines are a huge chaotic mess during the development phase, and I do make heavy use of References as well as hyperlinks in and out of the main text area to create a kind of internal “wiki” between the developing text and its supporting materials or related texts. Once you become familiar with Scrivener’s “browser” like feel to navigation, with the history buttons, as well as split views, it quite efficient, and easily one of my favourite things about writing in Scrivener (I most easily think within the “wiki” approach).

5

thank you for your reply Amber.

Most good programming (not writing) makes use of “references” and “pointers”. It really pays to store original material in one place and then reference it thereafter. Only one change is then required.

However, I loved all the ideas you provided me. I am a neophyte Scrivener user so I expect that at first I will be horribly ineffective in my composing…but hopefully I will learn the skills you suggested of using history and split screen and more.

Once again…thank you
bil