I have been using scrivener for Windows for a while and recently aquired an iPad mini for mobile work–I had been using a cheap Android tablet to write into txt files to later append to the project files on my main machine, which was quite a headache. However, my current work flow uses resilio sync to keep my projects synced between computers. It should work, however, it seems that ios scrivener has no option to open projects from the device.
Is there an option to open project files from the devices storage that I am missing, or am I just required to use Dropbox?
You are required to use Dropbox.
Do the tutorial…
This might not be what you’re looking for but you can use iTunes for syncing, as well.
You can use any mechanism that allows you to load an iDevice on your computer as a drive. iTunes has a very rudimentary interface for doing so, but you may find better options out there that let you mount the device under a drive letter and use sync tools to keep it up to date with a local copy on the computer.
Dropbox is not a necessity. Unless I’m actively testing it for the sake of purely testing it, I don’t even keep that service linked in the app, and strictly use local storage with disk mounting to manage projects with a USB cable.
Yeah, I went through the tutorial, hoping that there was just an option I had missed. As it turns out, it is like pulling teeth to find iOS apps that can actually open files stored on the device. I’ve already given up and switched my work flow through Dropbox.
And amber, yes, I was using resilio sync already to keep the files synchronized between devices (the project files were already on the iPad and synced between computer and tablet) , however, scrivener just lacks the option to open projects from the devices storage. As well, Dropbox seems to have been the better option anyway as iOS’s inability to multitask does not allow sync to run in the background.
Thank you all for your help.
Oh you mean some kind of central storage area that all apps can make use of? Alas, no, that’s entirely in violation of Apple’s vision—or something like that. It makes so sense to me, but they think it’s a good idea for every program to operate in its own little isolated sandbox with only the barest of most rudimentary mechanisms for cooperation between apps, but that’s not something we or any other developer can get around and still sell on their store. We’d have to sell off the store and require everyone to jailbreak their device to do differently. 
You can use iTunes for copying projects, not syncing changes.
Sync does require one to use dropbox, right?
The above sort of forum comment seems to have sadly misled me what to expect from Scrivener iOS and iTunes.
Or am I overlooking some way of reconciling changes in mac and iPad copies via iTunes?
All forms of editing on iOS and then opening the project later on will involve syncing the changes back into the full project. The changes that are made mobile are stored in a separate area of the project internally. So functionally speaking, copying the project back to your Mac and opening it, no matter how you get it there, is syncing. That can even be done by sending a .zip of the project to yourself via email. Everything needed for the Mac or Windows version to sync is self-contained within the project.
There is no real “syncing”.
The Mac or Windows version saves the project in the dropbox folder on the HD, the dropbox app copies the changed files to the Dropbox server. When you open the iOS version it reads the same project files from the Dropbox server and when you are done it saves the changed files to the server again where the desktop app reads them back.
So it’s always just copying back and forth…
Thanks for your replies. So much about iOS is new to me (coming from Android).