Still, I wouldn’t undertake full-on, first draft text entry on my iOS device. So, while you still need to keep your eyes on the keyboard, the process of writing is less cumbersome than in other iOS apps. It can also include a forward delete button, formatting and selection commands, as well as buttons for highlighting text or changing its color. This row (actually three rows you can scroll between) can contain other punctuation as well as navigation, providing arrows for moving up and down or left and right. For me, these are quotation marks and the double-dash. The app not only adds useful commands, including undo, redo, paste, comment and add link, but it also installs a customizable keyboard row to access your most-used characters. Scrivener for iOS also makes it somewhat easier to find characters (of the alphanumeric kind).
I spend so much time making sure my fingers hit the right characters on those tiny virtual keyboards that I can’t focus on the imaginary world I’m trying to describe.Ī very cool feature iOS offers that isn’t possible on a laptop is the ability to scale the size of the text up and down for better readability simply by pinching the screen. (Try doing that with your laptop!) Writing with Scrivener for iOSīut what about using Scrivener iOS for actual text editing? Personally, I’ve always hated writing on my iPad or iPhone. Take the shot and snap it right into your research folder for future reference. So, say you find a working gas pump in the desert that might cough up a gallon of unleaded for your marooned motorist. (An easy but clunky MacGyver I use is to copy text to an Apple Note as a backup before editing it in Scrivener).īut hey, you can import files from any of your cloud drives, from your photos and even using your camera. So, if it was a bad idea to have your protagonist escape Vegas only to become stranded on some dusty road in Death Valley with an empty gas tank, it’s going to be a hassle to rewrite him back to the safety of the Bellagio Hotel.
On the Mac you can take ‘snapshots’ of chapter files to create any number of backups to which you can quickly revert. IOS does offer some of the Mac’s ‘Inspector’ tools, labelling your chapters, adding notes and statuses. Unlike the Mac edition, iOS does not allow you to edit all your files in a single, composited scroll, nor does it provide the Mac’s outliner view. For those of you unfamiliar with Scrivener, the Corkboard allows you to create index-card-like synopses of every chapter and folder, and move them around on a virtual desktop if you want to play with the order. You can also see chapters in ‘Corkboard’ mode (iPad only). txt formats, but it’s still adequate if your agent demands the latest while you are still on I-15 scouting out likely desert settings for your crime novel’s climax.Īs on the Mac, iOS features a history function that simplifies finding the files you’ve worked on most recently. In this binder area you will also find a ‘Compile’ command. This feature is replicated in the iOS version, sliding out of the way when not in use, so navigation offers the same look and feel. In Scrivener for Mac, a ‘Binder’ contains all your folders, chapters, research and templates. (The Mac edition does this automatically.) The Interface After weeks of use, I’ve found Scrivener syncs reliably between both the big and little devices as long as when I’m done using it on iOS, I hit ‘sync’ to save my changes to Dropbox.
Whenever you switch over from your Mac, your iOS device will ask if you want to ‘Sync Now?’ A free update to the Mac program adds a ‘Mobile Sync’ button that ensures your laptop gets updated when you switch back. When you launch the iOS version, it asks you to link to a Dropbox account. Scrivener uses the cloud to synchronize your files across all your devices.
Now, when you take that research trip to Death Valley, you can bring your novel with you on your iPhone or iPad instead of having to lug a laptop.īut how much of the massive Mac edition translates into your little iOS device? And have they made writing on those exasperating virtual keyboards any less of a hassle? I was surprised to accomplish more work in Scrivener for iOS than I’d imagined.
After keeping its Mac users in suspense for years, Literature & Latte has finally released Scrivener for iOS.