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Atomic Scribbler -- a Windows replacement for Scrivener?
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Posted by tightbeam
Oct 14, 2017 at 12:09 PM
The notes feature has some promise, but it’s clunky like the rest of the software, and non-intuitive as well. For the short time I diddled with the software, I didn’t find the software sluggish on an i7 Windows 10 laptop with 16 GB and an SSD.
I’m surprised the developer didn’t offer his long-time Page Four users a discount to “upgrade” to Atomic Scribbler. They seem to have been left in the lurch.
—Bob
Posted by Paul Korm
Oct 14, 2017 at 03:50 PM
I’d say the same—but since they gave themselves an out by allegedly telling their customers “Atomic Scribbler is not a replacement product for PageFour” they absolved themselves of future customer-loyalty bonds.
I ran into similar with the crew at Clarify-It.com who announced they were abandoning their product with no promises of future support, and, oh by the way, if you like the product we just abandoned you might like our other product that is based on the old product and does similar things and costs $99/month. No discounts, sorry.
bobmclain wrote:
>I’m surprised the developer didn’t offer his long-time Page Four users a
>discount to “upgrade” to Atomic Scribbler. They seem to have been left
>in the lurch.
Posted by washere
Mar 22, 2018 at 03:55 PM
I’ve been playing with Scribbler. Is it a lightweight Scrivener?
Yes and no.
The yes is obvious why. It has a tree outline structure column on the left. With similar nodes & subnode, for chapters or acts, scenes & notes. It also has additional data types as note/etc types for research characters etc. Doesn’t have index cards nodes type though for a board or other features there, hence a cut-down version of Scrivener.
It has the additional data types column on the right, like Scrivener and Rightnote, Whizfolders etc. Much less functions and types etc. though, ie the lightweight version.
In the middle, it has the big editor or word-processor, like Scrivener et al.
Being a lightweight Scrivener, is that good or bad, surely bad? I don’t know. If you like distraction free writing, you could call this sort of feature-free writing vis-a-vis Scrivener. But surely that’s BS & jive. I think so, you can forget about Scrivener features and just write. Instead of fidgeting around looking for excuses and distractions such as bells & whistles features as procrastinating &/or blocked writers do. Maybe, but again I’m not sure. Maybe there is something in this lightweight aspect that might actually be beneficial. I feel so.
That’s why it’s a sort of lightweight Scrivener. But why the “no” part? It has differences. Unlike the right column in Scrivener, the right column here is like a mini editor flip box. Sort of like an index-card box you can flip through. Not an index card board though, just a little box to flip through. Again simpler, and a different use, fast access for notes & fragments. Can flip through the opened notes there relating to the current document or group of documents.
The biggest difference though is in the main central big editor window. This is where it gives Scrivener a run for it’s money and what Scrivener should have as a default feature. Multi tabbed documents at the top bar. You can open as many tabs as you want and quickly access each by clicking the top tabs, like in your web browser.
You don’t have to expand & collapse branches in the left column tree and scroll up & down the tiny column scroll bar to open another document. If you don’t think this is not good, imagine replacing your browser top multi tabs with a long left column you have to scroll up and down and fiddling in little areas. I love the outliner tree, don’t get me wrong, but this, top multi tabs in editor pane, is extra. Horses for courses. And a killer feature.
Scribbler is usable for me as it now has a dark theme. The dev thinks it’s useless. But he doesn’t know much about what people need or even want or i suspect about people in general.
There is a place for scribbler. Less complex projects than Scrivener for sure. But also i see it useful for bigger projects too. Before writing, i use a few other genres of software to get to this stage in the tool chain. Scribbler looks useful for begging to write the project with notes/etc from the other genres. However, once it’s roughly in a good enough shape, i can move the project from scribbler to Scrivener. That would be nice.
I think it has a future. You get updates for a year. He says he hasn’t decided on how much or how he’ll charge for upgrades beyond the first year and will decide before the first year after launch is up.
Scribbler is a bit of a Greek gods’ mythology type of hybrid creation. Basically it’s as if Scrivener raped NoteCase Pro and the bastard child born was named Atomic Scribbler.
The whole thing is not very intellectual, but the bastard works.
Posted by MadaboutDana
Mar 23, 2018 at 01:52 PM
Slightly baffled by this: Scrivener DOES have a “main central big editor window” as a default feature…
But you can set up Scrivener workspaces to do anything you like. In some of my files, I have four windows open simultaneously. In others, I go for two, side by side. Sometimes I just use that big ole’ main central editor window. You can save out multiple workspace configurations and reload them whenever you feel like a change of focus.
> The biggest difference though is in the main central big editor window. This is
> where it gives Scrivener a run for it’s money and what Scrivener should have as a
> default feature.
Posted by washere
Mar 23, 2018 at 02:57 PM
MadaboutDana wrote:
Slightly baffled by this: Scrivener DOES have a “main central big editor
>window” as a default feature…
>
>But you can set up Scrivener workspaces to do anything you like. In some
>of my files, I have four windows open simultaneously. In others, I go
>for two, side by side. Sometimes I just use that big ole’ main central
>editor window. You can save out multiple workspace configurations and
>reload them whenever you feel like a change of focus.
>
>> The biggest difference though is in the main central big editor
>window. This is
>> where it gives Scrivener a run for it’s money and what Scrivener
>should have as a
>> default feature.
I don’t know why the embafflement.
It’s not that:
>Scrivener DOES have a “main central big editor
>window” as a default feature…
Most major tree outliner editors, have!
Secondly I myself said that’s not the difference but THE SIMILARITY between the two. DOH!
Secondly, I wasn’t talking about multi Windows being open.
Further to what you said, Scrivener 3 has: multi floating Windows.
Thirdly, Scribbler DOES NOT HAVE multi Windows being open at the same time as a feature. As you say a parity equivalent feature, which is wrong as it doesn’t actually exist in scribbler.
Fourth, I did not say that either.
Fifth, I said multi tabbed Windows at the top bar of central editor window.
Then I went to explain this clearly.
Then I explained it again.
Then I have the example of a web browser window with multi tabs at the top bar.
Then I said Scrivener does not have this MULTI TABBED WINDOWS AT TOP BAR.
Scribbler does.
Frankly I thought I’d over-explained this simple difference. Honestly I thought so, but obviously not enough.
In fact there are simple structural misunderstandings of the basics by outliner coders/designers. I was going to explain one of those big ones holding back many top contenders, in the previous post too but didn’t. Thought might be too much for a single post.
>But you can set up Scrivener workspaces to do anything you like. In some
>of my files, I have four windows open simultaneously. In others, I go
>for two, side by side. Sometimes I just use that big ole’ main central
>editor window. You can save out multiple workspace configurations and
>reload them whenever you feel like a change of focus.
True. You can do lots of stuff in lots of software. Others can comment what they can do in Scrivener too.
Or other software.
Or other configurations, hacks, etc.
But that, or those, are not what I was talking about. I was talking about having multi tabbed buttons for Windows at the top bar of the central editor pane specifically
+
(and let’s get this bit clear too) For: a lightweight version or more frankly a smaller version knockoff of Scrivener. Not in Joe Blog’s app.
The guy even put a hint in the name, Scribbler vs. Scrivener, or might call it Scrivener Lite.
Scrivener does not have multi tabbed buttons at the top bar of main window. Scribbler does, as do main web browsers. That is what you quoted is about. As explained further in that post. The rest is irrelevant to that particular point. Infinite configurations & features are possible in other software. I wasn’t talking about them. Just that feature.
Scrivener should have done this, what I actually talked about ie multi top bar tabs in editor pane, in version 2, when browsers had already implemented it (big Bart Simpson: DOH). The new Version 3 doesn’t have it either. Unless there is a hack which I like to know about, but I doubt it.