JoshuaAmarelo Posted June 23, 2014 Report Share Posted June 23, 2014 Hello, all. I'm just curious how you guys go about saving documents for novels in the works. Do you save each chapter as an individual document? Each scene? Or do you save it all in one file and work on it that way? Thanks for your thoughts, -Joshua Amarelo 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sunshine Posted July 3, 2014 Report Share Posted July 3, 2014 I save a document for a chapter! I have to number them like 01, 02, 03, etc., so I know where each chapter should go. But if I have something to add in between, it can get messy real quick... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Endurant Archivist Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 I save the entire book as a single file. Then I keep multiple files for major revisions, including the date revisions began. Then I keep the completed edition that I'm selling in a "Completed Novel" folder. This way, I can access old information, while also have a one stop folder for my currently available novels and short stories. @JoshuaAmarelo what about you? @Sunshine does it help you separate the thoughts between chapters? I tried that–then found that I couldn't tie the chapters together well. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sunshine Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 @Sunshine does it help you separate the thoughts between chapters? I tried that–then found that I couldn't tie the chapters together well. I haven't had problems tying chapters together. I usually have a few different documents open while I'm working on a chapter, like my outline, the preceding chapter, and other info I need. I find that smaller documents are easier for me to work with. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Argent Posted July 8, 2014 Report Share Posted July 8, 2014 From what I've seen in Brandon's videos, he keeps the novel in a single document, maybe having a separate one for the outline. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robinski Posted February 27, 2015 Report Share Posted February 27, 2015 (edited) Yeah, single document, even with a 100k-200k* word novel I find it easy enough to search for stuff or leave bookmarks for relevant sections and referring back. Like Endurant Archivist (do you have a nickname that isn't 17 characters long, Mr. Archivist?), I keep a series of older versions of my ms, and always track changes that I make from critiques and edits. Traceability is king! I also have a separate 'Notes' file where I keep all my character sketches; plot outline, DP; glossary; etc. etc. [* - Don't know what numbers I had in mind earlier - complete drivel!] Edited March 27, 2015 by Robinski 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stormvisions Posted March 26, 2015 Report Share Posted March 26, 2015 (edited) I use PageFour by http://www.badwolfsoftware.com/ which works well for my needs. Currently $39. It has the basic editing and some other tools (archive, word count etc), allows you to save snapshots of documents (say before a change which you might want to roll back), archive versions, you can select one or more pages and export them as a single document (for example you want to send someone three different chapters as a single Word document) - or you can save them as individual files. Behind the scenes they are RTF but I believe they can be imported/exported to others (and Word handles RTF's anyway). Here's a quick snapshot of my organization but it is basically a simple folder structure and you can have multiple books. Edited March 26, 2015 by stormweasel 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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