New in Version 1.5
- Many layout improvements and bug fixes.
- New Dialog window design.
- The program opens with a Welcome Screen, giving information about the program. This can be turned off for future program starts. The Welcome Screen can be opened from the Help menu.
- Every program Section has a Guided Tour which will explain the layout and give information about the Jarvis Method. The Tour is different for each Section and can be started from the Help menu.
Stories Section
- To avoid database errors, it is no longer possible to click on a story’s name to activate it. Instead, choose the story from the Story Dropdown menu.
- Clicking on a Character’s name will navigate to the normal Characters Section. The Single Character layout has been removed.
Characters Section
- Only the characters belonging to a specific story are shown instead of all the characters from all the stories.
- Easier way to print a character by the use of a print button next to its name, instead of from the menu.
- New Characters can be added directly from within the Character Section, no need to go to the Story Section first.
- Date of birth and date of death can be entered after which the character’s age will be displayed.
Worlds Section
- The blue Questions bar has been removed because that information was also mentioned in the “About..” information fields. It is now possible to edit the text in the text fields directly, which is more user friendly.
Creation Steps Section
- The 12 Story Steps now show story step information check boxes which can be checked off while writing the Event Outlines.
Write Section
- Every chapter in the chapters row has a popup button that contains print- and delete buttons. The chapter can be printed (or exported as PDF) as Single Line or Double Line Spaced. The printing paper layout is set to Letter format paper (8.5 x 11 inch) with 1 inch page margins all around. Using the Print Dialog, this can be adjusted for A4 paper format, using the “Scale to fit paper size” option in the Paper Handling menu.
- A Toolbar with 3 Header Styles, a Ruler and a Bullet List has been added above the text field.
- A dictionary, thesaurus and grammar check button have been added above the text field: selecting a word and clicking one of them will open the corresponding websites.
- Right clicking inside a text field shows the Format menu from where a text’s font-, size-, style- and color can be chosen.
- A new Character and Location can be created by first selecting a word in the text field, then clicking the Character- or House picture at the right of the chapter title field.
- The Chapter row can be hidden/shown by clicking the left pointing arrow button it, giving more space for the text field. To also hide the top part of the window, first click in the text field so it is actively selected. Then click the upwards pointing arrow in the top left off the screen. To return to the previous layout, click the horizontal line at the top of the screen.
Story Clock Section
- New clock design with tooltips on the Step Numbers. The pencil in the clock points to the active selected Story Step in the Creations Steps Section and Write Section.
- When working on a Character- or Myth Category story, the hero’s Inner Need character arc will be displayed as footsteps in the clock. Hovering with the mouse over these feet will give information about the hero’s struggle.
Story Examples
- A story database (to be opened from the Help menu) with 10 story examples has been added, showing how the Jarvis Method is being reflected in a story and can be used to create a new story. A story created here can be transferred to the main storyCraft window by clicking the green “Use for New Story” button.
Storyline window added
- A Storyline window has been added, available from the Windows menu. The pencil in the Storyline points to the active selected Story Step in the Creations Steps Section and Write Section.
Menu Changes
- The Menus have been repositioned to be conform to general menu design.
- The Print menu has been removed. Character/Chapter printing is now done from within the Character/Write Sections.
- File menu: Using the “Backup” and “Restore from Backup” menu item, the export location for stories can now be freely chosen, this was fixed set to the Documents folder before.
- Edit menu: A Search Online option is added.
- Navigation menu: Navigates between the 8 StoryCraft Sections.
- A Format bar with the usual text formats has been added.
- Export menu: Chapters, Story Steps, Characters and Worlds/Locations can be exported as plain text files and specially prepared for Scrivener and WritItNow.
- Windows menu: : “Zoom in/Zoom out” have been removed; StoryCraft will now only work in 100 % zoom. This has been changed to avoid layout problems and because it’s actually very uncommon to change the zoom level of the user Interface. A better way would be to change the screen resolution of the Mac OS itself.
- “Save Window Positions” has renamed to “Save as Workspace.”
- Help menu: Tooltips can no longer be turned On or Off; now only the most important tooltips will always be shown, the more obvious ones have been removed.
- A “Check for Update” function has been added.