The Manuscript View

New in 1.3.

A novel, a thesis or a long report is easier to write as many documents, a chapter each, in folders for the parts. The Manuscript view puts them back together so you can see the whole book. The running order is on the left, with each chapter’s length and what happens in it. The book itself is on the right, to read straight through. The contents and the margin step aside until you close it.

Opening it

  • Right-click a folder in the contents and choose Open as Manuscript. To open the whole project, right-click below the contents and choose Open Project as Manuscript.
  • Or use the View menu. It has Open Project as Manuscript, and Open “chapters” as Manuscript when you’ve highlighted a folder in the contents with the arrow keys.

To close it, press Escape or ⌘W, or click the × at the top right or the window’s own close button. The window comes back exactly as it was. Close it again to close the window.

To try it out, open the Feature Tour’s chapters folder. It’s a short novella, The Winter Ferry.

The running order

The left side lists the folder’s documents and folders in the same order as the contents. A folder inside is a part. Click its arrow to show or hide its chapters, and Grasmere remembers which parts are open until you quit.

Each row shows the chapter’s title, taken from its first heading, with its word count and its synopsis if it has one. The top of the window gives the word and chapter count for the whole manuscript.

A synopsis is a line of front matter at the top of the document:

---
synopsis: Ellen takes the ferry out alone in the mist, steering by her father's rules.
---

Type it there, or add a synopsis field in the margin, under Front Matter. Other editors and GitHub ignore it, so it does no harm anywhere else.

Changing the order

Drag a chapter up or down, or select it and press ⌥⌘↑ or ⌥⌘↓. Right-clicking a row offers Move Up and Move Down too, and VoiceOver has them as actions.

A chapter only moves within its own folder. To move one into another part, drag it in the contents.

The Manuscript view and the contents share one order, so they always agree. It’s kept as a list of links in the folder’s index.md, or in project.md for the top level of the project, which means the order goes with your files to any other editor. If a folder has no index.md, Grasmere makes one the first time you move something in it. See The Contents.

Reading it through

The right side is the whole manuscript as one long page, in your theme’s type and colours. Markdown is shown as it reads, not as it’s written. Each part has its title and each chapter starts under its own heading.

Select a row and the page goes to that chapter. As you scroll, the chapter you’re reading is marked in the list.

When you spot something to change, double-click the passage. The view closes and the document opens in the editor at that paragraph. A single click leaves you reading, so you can select and copy. To open a chapter at its start, double-click its row or press Return.

Even a long book opens in a second or so and stays quick to scroll and reorder, because chapters are drawn as you reach them.

Exporting

Click Export at the top right.

  • Publish to PDF typesets the manuscript the same way Publish to PDF does from the contents. Manuscript style is standard manuscript format, double-spaced Times with a title page and word count. Book style uses your theme’s typography, with a page for each part. See Publishing.
  • Export as Word Document saves the whole manuscript as one .docx. There’s a title page, then each part and chapter in order, every chapter on a new page under its title. Headings, lists, quotations and pictures come out in Word’s own styles, as they do when you export a single document, so Word’s navigation pane lists the parts and chapters.

Neither includes front matter, so synopses are left out.

You can send the Word document out for review. Every paragraph carries a hidden marker, and Grasmere notes which chapter each came from. When the reviewer’s copy comes back, choose Export ▸ Import Review. Each comment and change goes to its chapter’s margin, and each chapter in the running order shows how many are still open (“3 open”).

Comments on the title page, a part’s title or the references go to a Review notes document in the folder, which is left out of the book.

The review data lives in a hidden .review folder beside each chapter, and moves with it when Grasmere renames or moves the chapter. If you copy a chapter on its own in the Finder, its review stays behind. See Review.