Thanks for the update, Lee. Some of the most distracting bugs (indenting, spell-checking, mutant fonts, etc.) have been fixed, so I’m finding that writing with Scrivener is a pure joy. Maybe I’m unique but I haven’t noticed any lag at all when using the program (with an early version while backspacing over a line of text, yes, but not with 1.3). I love that it provides lots of great features but stays in the background while I write, rather than imposing functions and tabs and fields to populate.
I wanted to thank you for all the great work so far during the Beta, thanks for porting this great app to Windows in the first place, and thanks for giving us a glimpse at what you’re working on next. Your work is very much appreciated.
Sorting the RTF bugs out? Yes top priority, no question.
All other bugs? Sort out the top 100 and number them 1 to 100 (doh!). Invite people to submit an email (or a forum post if easier?) voting for the top ten bugs - but here’s the interesting bit - people are allowed to vote for ten bugs e.g. “1,23,4,5,7,66,52,87,22,10”, the order being unimportant, or ten times for one bug e.g. “42,42,42,42,42,42,42,42,42,42” if that is the most important one for them. Or a mix of five votes, 3 votes, 2 votes for the top 3 bugs etc.
A quick bit of spreadsheetery or string parsing, and you’ve got a prioritised list of bugs.
Hey Lee, thanks for everything so far. Very happy with Scrivener.
Your idea of voting to prioritize bug fixes / missing features is excellent. Perhaps the forum’s polling function can be used to do that – it’d probably be easier than sorting through emails, etc, and give folks a nice visual indication of the rankings.
Very good Idea. Perhaps you can use something existing
I liked this one that exactly does what you proposed:
uservoice.com/plans?utm_campaign … rvoice.com
they are using this one, but I don’t know which version
uservoice.com/plans?utm_campaign … rvoice.com
Markus
P.S: Congratulations Lee for staying such focussed even working all day, all night
I think they were thinking about a poll using the tools built into the forum (phpBB). Selecting NEW TOPIC permits you to start a poll instead of a text thread.
How awesome is Scrivener for Windows?
I’ve already doubled my output from my last attempt at NaNo, and I’m still going strong. That’s how awesome.
The tool, even in beta form, does what it needs to, doesn’t try to do too much, and just lets you get it done. I love the corkboard feature (that’s why I’m still going).
Great job guys, and I love the work you’ve done from 1.0 to 1.3.
Thank YOU!
– badger
Thanks JJSlote. I had not considered Wordpad core DLL as I wanted to have the ability to augment and modify any part of our core text engine as Scrivener matures over the years - I wanted to have complete flexibility here with no boundaries. For example, there are Mac Scrivener specific RTF codes/hacks we need to cater for which would be difficult with a proprietary closed system such as Wordpad. Keith, on the Mac platform has had to engage a myriad of hocus-pocus-shape-shifting-trickering to get the proprietary Mac text system to jump through the Scrivener hoops. I did not want to have the same frustrations on Windows, it’s certainly tougher up front as you have less to offer initially and can’t leverage from in built functionality out of the box, but longer term the yield is going to be far better for us. So, it’s all about flexibility and not being tied down and constrained technically.
Oh, there’s one other thing. If I went and used a Microsoft DLL for Scrivener’s core text engine, I’d need a volunteer sacrifice to go and tell those tech-crazed Linux zealots, who happen to use Scrivener for Linux natively, that someone just stepped on and crushed their toy - any volunteers?
Lee
I think this is a wise investment of time as well. There already things you can do with the Scrivener RTF engine that WordPad has trouble with, such as footnotes, comments, tables and proper inline images that are supported by a variety of word processors on multiple platforms. Once it gets over the growing pains, it will be a much better platform to work off of—especially for writers which need access to more than WordPad’s basic authoring provides.
Just have to say, thank you Lee for doing this. I have been looking forward to the day Scrivener was released for Windows for about a year. I believe that fixing the core RTF engine problems is definitely the number one priority.
I’ll pass.
…there are ways, I’m just saying. 
Just introduce a couple of circular dependencies in the next version, it’ll keep them busy long enough that they won’t notice anything else.
(I’m nice! No really! 
)
I discovered Scrivener about four days ago (at 2am, when I suddenly decided that doing NaNo was a GREAT idea: a thought I recanted the next morning when I remembered how much work I have to do this month) and am already using it for both papers and tutorials - no fiction yet, it makes me feel guilty for never researching my fiction - and I have to say I love it. After pasting a few paragraphs of German reference text the whole marking random bits of words as misspelled (even when it’s actually the whole word that’s wrong, y’see, or in the case of German the whole ten-word portmanteau) got too much to bear… and I come here and see it’s already fixed! What more could a girl ask for? Thankyou. 
It’s great to hear text integrity is the top priority for the next revision. I do have a question about what to do with existing imported text. I’ve imported (through copy & paste) quite a bit of text and see the usual odd spacing and all. I would like to do some work on the text, but do I need to wait until the editor problems are fixed or will the fixes correct the problems in my existing text? As far as what other features to work on next, I vote whichever are the most efficient at getting Scrivener to release 
In general, I’d like to say don’t worry about formatting to much, for two reasons.
- Compiler will be able to fix most issues and homogenise the text
- A feature will be added which will let you select a bunch of documents and conform them to your preferred editing preferences.
Right now it feels awkward, because everyone is used to static programs that force you to work the way you print, or to be stuck with how things are typeset because that is how they are. At the moment, Scrivener feels that way because not all of its tools are in place or perfected, but in the end it will prove to be a much more dynamic environment.
Another way of putting it would be: go ahead and be sloppy now. Don’t worry about formatting because you’ll be able to fix that all up with one sweep when these features are finalised. One of the foundational principles of Scrivener was to “be sloppy”. Write without worrying about header styles and indenting and line spacing—let the program bother with that later on. These tools are not 100% done yet, but they will be, so you can start with the hubris now—if you dare. 
P.S. None of this is meant to downgrade the importance of RTF stability.
That is great and it is a different way of thinking of things! My credit card trembles with the pent up anticipation of buying Scrivener! 
Definitely true! Most authors find it very liberating to shirk all of the hassles that come along with working in Word or similar solutions. Once you get comfortable with the notion of working in an authorial environment instead of a typesetting environment, it leaves you with nothing but the words to focus on. Write, write, write!
The main exception will be those who need to use formatting to convey meaning in their texts. Most often this will be academics, biographers, and so on who need block quoting and so on. Most novel writing requires nothing beyond italics. Sometimes you’ll need a little finesse if you have telepathic characters, IM chats, or other special cases.
That does sound annoying, augmenting the Qt framework to suit the needs of your development. Of course, the end product is perhaps one that allows greater ease of maturity through the years rather than having to swap through core frameworks and move through more hoops and redo done progress.
I suppose there isn’t much more to it but to wait for the changes to take place, unfortunately. These issues are much less Scrivener than they are of Scrivener’s framework, and I think FocusWriter (?) may also benefit significantly if augmenting the source code of Qt to allow all these issues to be fixed. IIRC, Focuswriter’s developer utilises the Qt framework as well. It might be of interest to you, this tidbit of information.
I’ll look forward to the updates in the near future, by right now there isn’t much more that can be done other than to wait quietly and just be patient. We all want Scrivener for Windows, surely, but unfortunately before it can develop further, it seems that its backbone needs to be reinforced.
Such is the difficulty of developing software sometimes. I think we’re all confident you’ll get out a product many times better than what we have now in about 3-4 weeks, and I think, given the time that most of us have been waiting for Scrivener for Windows, waiting that amount of time might be fine.
Not much to be done but to wait and be patient.
PS: Have fun coding!
Lee, it’s sounding like a wise overview, and that you guys do have understanding of what you are about very well in hand, and for the most significant areas especially.
The one thing I don’t see addressed yet is that of ability-lockout and Scrivener-having-to-close bugs. Those are probably pretty important, when they occur, and of course they are often the most troublesome to get a handle on, as once you know where they are, often they’re easy to fix, but that finding out of where the issue actually begins can be hard.
It’s proportionally up to us to document how to get into trouble this way, and I’m trying things to duplicate what I ran into right after installing 1.3, after which many actions would cause a crash-close. So far, not getting it back, but I will find it, and then will report.
I’m thinking you might keep a block of operational capacity earmarked for fixing things like this, as they get documented, so that reliability for writing’s value gets timely and consistent attention. It might give a suitable variety to plowing ahead on well-defined coding as well, and it’s what can allow us to invite further friends to sample Scrivener.
Otherwise, I’ve very glad to hear the tone and clarity in what you’re saying. Each of you individual’'s personal interest and insight in this way is what makes the project, and so the project is healthy. And it is a fine one, as you know.
The later plan for prioritizing is probably quite a good idea too.
Thanks, Lee, and all of you.
Regards,
Clive
AsyouknowBob, parsing RTF is a nightmare because (A) undocumented and (B) full of cruft from days we dare not name. Good luck.
I agree with DiscoveredJoy’s idea on selecting the most important bugs individually. Also, I’ll pass on telling the Linux users. They’re dreams are crushed often enough as it is. XD
Max looked up, his eyes wide and his lower lip quivering. His eyes gained a sheen of moist. When he spoke, his voice was uneven. ‘Tell the Linux users? No… nononono!’ His head shook hard from side to side for each no, and then he stood up fast and headed for the door.
‘I’d rather jump into a pit full of vipers.’ He slammed the door behind him as he left the room, and then he leaned against the door, and closed his eyes. When he wiped his brow with a handkerchief he retrieved from the jeans pocket, his hand trembled. Tell the Linux users… indeed.
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