I just came back from a trip abroad, after about a month, and I found the beta 2 for Scrivener. It’s just fabulous. I’m going to move my two projects to this version–my work in progress, and the first chapter of my dissertation. All the new features are great, but two are specially welcomed, footnotes and Edit Scrivenings.
I will surely report if there is something not quite working for me. I want to thank you for all the time an effort to make Scrivener the best writer’s app in the market. I hope that the final release comes around soon, so we can regsiter our copies.
Best regards,
Keith: I’ve had five magazine and newspaper deadlines, plus a quick trip to LA for a story, plus an amazing arts festival here in Portland, all converging on me in the past 2 weeks, so forgive me for not posting earlier, as I’ve been really under the gun. I’ve used Scrivener beta 1 for all of these projects and am just in awe at how intuitive and thoughtfully organized it is. I didn’t even have time to read the tutorial before trying it on the first couple of short (< 1000 wd.) pieces, and yet I had no trouble figuring out how it worked, always a sign of well designed software. No technical issues or bugs appeared; in fact, I was surprised at how fast everything happened. And astonished at how many features I’d expected to have to request were already there.
I did make a list of suggestions for the wish list – only to find that three out of four (e.g. word counts in outline view, very helpful when building a piece in parts yet still needing to know how much room I’ve got left) have already been incorporated in Beta 2, including one (screenplay/script view) you’d previously rejected. That alone solidified my decision to buy Scrivener instead of another candidate (Supernotecard for Scriptwriting). The only one left is – well, I’ll post that in the wish list forum.
Anyway, as I embark on a couple of bigger stories this week, I promise to post if I notice any problems or come up with any suggestions. And I will RTFM, RSN. I certainly haven’t tried all of Scriv’s features yet. But I just couldn’t hold back any longer without telling you what a fantastic application you’ve got here. I’d pretty much decided to use a combination of DevonNote, OmniOutliner and TextEdit or Mellel for my work, but now I think I’ll just go with Devon and Scriv, and I may even eventually wean myself from Devon for all but the biggest projects. (Since I have Mellel already, I’ll use that for the rare cases I need final footnote formatting.) You can sign me up as a buyer.
Thanks for all your smart, hard work and also your quick responsiveness here on the forums. I hope you’ll be able to continue the personal touch when Scrivener becomes the monster-selling app it deserves to be and your software empire approaches Gatesian proportions…
Thanks again and congrats!
Thank you so much for all your kind words and positive feedback - it really makes all this effort worthwhile to know that it is making a difference and helping writers in their daily lives. Frankly, I can’t wait to get stuck in as a proper user myself, but that will have to wait until 1.0 is wrapped up!
just downloaded b2 and about to take it for a spin
(that’s good news, bad news for me: i was just working on post about wishlist, questions, et cet,. all based on b1, so …)
quick question:
i just noticed that the modification date for tutorial is aug 24 (unlike the 17 sept date for readme). can i assume you have not worked on it since? if so, i’d be happy, eventually to update it. let me know. (I am not going to go through it now but shall dive into b2)
[size=100]That will teach me to go away for a few days! Returned to a new beta and more new posts than I can possibly wade through, but I will. What a great on-line forum and community you have there, Keith. Just ran beta2 through its paces and really like all the modifications.
Might a make a humble suggestion, that you really do freeze the feature list now, and aim toward a final release of S1.0 sometime before Christmas. SCRIV is stable enough now to match the stability and quality of most v1.0 releases that I have used. beta 3 might remove most of the bugs and beta 4 the last of the red hot betas for now. When they were busy tweaking the original Mac design, Steve Jobs’s mantra was “great artists ship” with reference to getting the product out there for the world to look at. Words to live by for writers and scientitst too. I think you will realize some amazing benefits to making v 1 publicly available (and for sale). And we’ll all continue to bug you for fixes and wishes, honest. Just a thought. [/size]
You are definitely right, Bob, but I have to wait until I am happy that it is stable. Most of what I have left to do is relatively minor - tweaks, really - but I think they need doing before 1.0. Certainly I hope to release around Christmas. I just don’t want to be in a position where I suddenly get a lot of customers who notice a lot of bugs or find something really jarring. The feature list is already frozen - everything that I am working on is just refinements to the current feature set, really, with the exception of suggestions that make me go, “Wow!”, of course.
Just found out about this software, and it’s brilliant. Much use for this with my thesis. I’ve noticed a few things that seem like they could use working on, but I’m not sure yet whether that’s the program or my lack of experience with it. I’ll hover around the forums, I guess…
To make Scrivener as useful as possible go to the Tips and Trick thread and have a good look around, especially at AmberV’s header post, which is a sticky. It is chock full of really excellent advice - and it is pretty easy to follow.
Make sure you have the latest release (this is posted under an earlier beta 2 release - I assume you at least have beta 3).
Try to get a feel for each thread and its purpose - Keith, the application’s developer, has set them up to handle most issues and innovations. So try to direct your questions to the right thread and someone will pick it up on their radar and get a reply to you as quickly as possible.
If you need an example of how others use the application, just ppm someone and ask for a screenshot - two or three screen shots and it all becomes instantly clear.
Thanks very much for your welcome, I’m enjoying the software a lot already. Yep, beta 3 is what I have, and I’ve been looking at the forums for tips, though there is a lot to read…well, that’s a good thing innit.
to update it. let me know. (I am not going to go through it now but shall dive into b2)
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