What I’m looking for is a way to input my writing goals in terms of a daily/monthly word count and select the period of time (days/months) that I’d like to get it done so I can track my progress. I realize I can select a total word count goal in Scrivener (I do that now) but what I’m looking for is something a little more robust - so that I may set the period of time in which I’d get it done as well as the word count goal… and with some stats to go with it. Does Scrivener do this?
If you’re familiar with NaNoWriMo within each account there are stats and a graph to track our progress and this is pretty close to what I’m looking for. But I’d like to be able to set the number of days (nano is always 30 days) and then set my daily or monthly word count goal. This kind of thing would be really helpful for me as I work.
If Scrivener doesn’t do this, do you know of a program that does? (for mac OS X of course…)
Lastly, thank you for the creation of such a helpful and functional program - Scrivener totally rocks.
The latest mac version has the deadline functionality built into the Project Targets interface. It lets you set which days of the week you write on, and automatically calculates your daily word count, adjusting it as you progress toward your deadline.
But as for keeping up with stats on how you wrote in the past, the best tool for that is a spreadsheet. While you can’t edit a spreadsheet in scrivener, you can store the document in your Project (and even use a blank one as part of a custom template), which is handy.
I see that now in Project Targets, thanks! It can do some of the stuff I want but not all of it (as you noted).
What I am looking for is a small program (within a writing program?) that I basically set up with my projected date of finish, the days I’m going to work on it and the word count per day I need and my progress from beginning through till the end. This type of thing is very useful for me and I get more writing done, it’s motivating when I have something like that.
Wish something like that existed! If I wrote programs I’d make one. Just like the nanowrimo one except ‘programmable’ and one I could install on my computer. If anything like this exists, please post it.
Hugh, that is great! I opened it in numbers and I see what the template does and this will work wonderfully well for my writing goals, progress, etc. Thank you so much!
I’ll play around with it in numbers (I have excel too) and see what I can do with it… though I confess I’ve never actually used these programs for anything other than opening files that are sent to me… probably one of the few that does not have experience w/ spreadsheet programs, I realize.
This makes me quite happy, little things matter. Thanks again Hugh.
Thanks again Hugh.