Take Control of
Scrivener 3

Scrivener is a powerful tool for managing long-form writing projects—like novels and screenplays—and Take Control of Scrivener 3 gives you all the details you need to know to harness its potential. In this book, best-selling author Kirk McElhearn walks you through setting up, organizing, writing, formatting, revising, and compiling a Scrivener project, whether you’re working on a Mac, a Windows PC, or in iOS/iPadOS.

Using this extensive guide, you’ll be able to:

• Meet Scrivener: Learn about the Scrivener philosophy and its basic layout
• Start your project: Pick a template and add existing materials to your project
• Brainstorm and organize: Discover three different ways to work with your material using the Binder, Corkboard, and Outliner.
• Set up your writing environment and avoid distractions: Choose default fonts and colors, opt for Script Mode if you’re writing a script or screenplay, and simplify your workspace by hiding interface elements or by using Composition Mode or Full Screen Mode.
• Make the most of key features: Learn how to work with styles; use annotations and comments; add footnotes and endnotes; view more than one file at once; use collections to view selected items from the Binder; store bookmarks and project notes; and share and synchronize your project with others.
• Go further with Scrivener: Get the details on special features like Scrivenings View (write in sections, but view as a single document) and Snapshots (allows you to make and view periodic backups of your text).
• Revise and edit your work: Learn how to find and replace text, and work with revisions.
• Use Scrivener in iOS and iPadOS: Sync your projects to iOS/iPadOS and work on an iPhone or iPad.
• Print and export: Understand the process of preparing your project to be printed, and what’s involved in compiling it so that it can be exported in a different format.

Kirk also highlights the many changes to Scrivener since the last version (see the What’s New section below), including updates to the interface, styles, outlining and metadata capabilities, and improved searching and writing features. In addition, he explains brand-new features in Scrivener 3, including Bookmarks (lets you store references to other sections of your project), Linguistic Focus (Mac only—highlights specific elements such as dialog, adverbs, or adjectives), Section types (such as Chapter Text and Scene), and Copyholders (allows you to view three or four documents at once).

About Kirk McElhearn

Kirk McElhearn writes about Apple hardware and software, books, music, and more. As a Senior Contributor to Macworld for more than 15 years, he wrote hundreds of articles, including the Ask the iTunes Guy column. He is a regular contributor to The Mac Security Blog, the Literature & Latte blog, where he writes about their writing app Scrivener, and TidBITS, as well as several other websites and magazines. He is co-host of several podcasts, including The Next Track, a podcast about how people listen to music today, and Write Now with Scrivener. Visit his website Kirkville.