Scrivener Hardcopy manual

Does anyone know if there is a hardcopy manual available for Scrivener? I prefer a paper version. I know it would eventually become obsolete but I would find it extremely useful.

Stuart

@AntoniDol has published one.
Check his profile (click on his tag I just here inserted), you’ll find a link to it.

There are links to other resources as well on LL’s website.

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Some users will print out the PDF version of the manual that’s available from Scrivener’s Help menu.

At 700+ pages, it’s not something everyone will do.

If you have a few chapters that you return to regularly, you might consider printing just those out so you’re not battling with whatever PDF reader you’re using.

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I would also add that the PDF in the software can sometimes be out of date (notably for a good long while the Mac version was ancient, and missing major revisions). So if one is going to spend that much paper and ink on a full print-out, definitely do so from a copy downloaded from the website. I typically post revisions monthly to the website.

If your eyes can take it, you can significantly cut down on paper use by setting your printer to put two pages on each side in landscape orientation, double-sided, for a total of four pages per sheet.

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Hi AmberV, since I posted my question and read your response I’ve reviewed my request and decided that if you update the manual every month the printed version becomes less appealing :woozy_face: Though a thought – is there an ebook or Kindle version available, do you know?

You can download it as a project, compile it any way you want.
(It is also good compile practice.)
:wink:

With the caveat that the .scriv version is extremely out of date, and a Markdown-based project—which means if you run it through the “normal” ePub generator you’ll get raw Markdown in it—yes you could do that. It would certainly be an interesting exercise is Section Type handling, especially given how the manual uses outlining conventions the standard “Ebook” compile Format really has no way of addressing out of the box. For example, how each menu command, and most every checkbox and other UI control, are individual binder items that depends on the title to help generate a bold + hanging indent formatted paragraph.

You might start to appreciate why there isn’t an official one. :laughing: It’s on my some-day list, but it would be probably days if not weeks of work to do it proper.

I keep a copy of the manual on my iPad in my chosen pdf reading app.

Would an epub version really be preferable?

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@AmberV, does this mean that any time I want to check the manual, I should go to the website and re-download it?

One of the useful elements of the help menu in Scriv (and other programmes) is that the manual is readily available and easily accessible. But as you say (and I recently found out), that version is often quite outdated. Still, it seems a bit awkward to have to re-download every time a quick query or perusal of the manual is necessary, just in case the query happens to touch upon a recently updated portion.

Since the underlying functionality is pretty stable, I don’t think that’s necessary. It took me several months to realize that the installed version was out of date, and I use the manual constantly.

But definitely checking for a manual update should be the first thing you try if the software doesn’t seem to be working as described.

Is adding the latest version of the manual to the installer / updater something you would consider doing? I mean, it’s not huge, about 5% of the app package. If it’s included and part of the Help menu, it should be up to date IMHO.

Aside: Am I the only one who read “Scrivener hardcore manual”?

My prior comment was made mainly within the framework of giving some advice on printing out a physical copy for themselves. It makes sense to make sure you have the latest version. A few typo fixes or reorganisation choices in a stable version isn’t going to make much of a difference for day to day usage. If the revision number on the copyright page matches the software version you’re okay.

But yeah, the website design leaves something to be desired when it comes to knowing if you have latest version or not. The only way to find out is to download again!

Good to know, thanks @AmberV and @kewms