novelWriter/docs/source/usage_interface.rst

.. _a_ui:

******************
The User Interface
******************

.. _Compose Key: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compose_key

This sections covers in more detail what all the information on the user interface is for, and how
you can organise your project, and how you use the editor, viewer and outline panel.


.. _a_ui_tree:

The Project Tree
================

The main window contains a project tree in the left-most panel. It shows the entire structure of
the project, and has four columns:

**Column 1**
   The first column shows the icon and label of each folder, document, or note in your project. The
   label is not the same as the title you set inside the document. However, the document's label
   will appear in the header above the document text itself so you know where in the project an
   open document belongs. The icon is selected based on the type of item, and for novel documents,
   the level of the first header in the document text.

**Column 2**
   The second column shows the word count of the document, or the sum of words of the child items
   for folders and documents with subdocuments. If the counts seem incorrect, they can be updated
   by rebuilding the project index from the :guilabel:`Tools` menu, or by pressing :kbd:`F9`.

**Column 3**
   The third column indicates whether the document is considered active or inactive in the project.
   You can use this flag to indicate that a document is still in the project, but should not be
   considered an active part of it. When you run the :guilabel:`Build Novel Project` tool, you can
   filter based on this flag. You can change this value from the context menu.

**Column 4**
   The fourth column shows the user-defined status or importance labels you've assigned to each
   project item. See :ref:`a_ui_tree_status` for more details. You can change these labels from the
   context menu.

Right-clicking an item in the project tree will open a context menu under the cursor, displaying
a selection of actions that can be performed on the selected item.

At the top of the tree, you will find a set of buttons.

* The first button is a quick links button that will show you a dropdown menu of all the root 
  folders in your project. Selecting one will move to that position in the tree. You can also
  activate this menu by pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`L`.
* The next two buttons can be used to move items up and down in the project tree. This is the only 
  way to move root folders.
* The next button opens a dropdown menu for adding new items to the tree. This includes root 
  folders. You can also activate this dropdown menu by pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`N`.
* The last button is a menu of further actions on the entire project tree.

.. tip::
   Under the :guilabel:`Transform` submenu in the context menu of an item, you will find several
   options on how to change a document or folder. This includes changing between document and note,
   splitting them into multiple documents, or merging child items into a single document.

Below the project tree you will find a small details panel showing the full information of the
currently selected item. This panel also includes the latest paragraph and character counts in
addition to the word count.


.. _a_ui_tree_novel:

The Novel Tree
--------------

An alternative way to view the project structure is the novel tree. You can switch to this view by
selecting the :guilabel:`Novel Tree View` button in the sidebar. This view is a simplified version
of the view in the :guilabel:`Outline`. It is convenient when you want to browse the structure of
the story itself rather than the document files.

.. note::
   You cannot reorganise the entries in the novel tree, or add any new documents, as that would
   imply restructuring the content of the document files. Any editing must be done in the project
   tree. However, you can add new headings to existing documents, or change references, which will
   be updated in this view.


.. _a_ui_tree_status:

Document Importance and Status
------------------------------

Each document or folder in your project can have either a "Status" or "Importance" flag set. These
are flags that you control and define yourself. The app doesn't do anything with them at all. To
modify the labels, go to their respective tabs in :guilabel:`Project Settings`.

The "Status" flag is intended to tag a Novel document as for instance a draft or as completed, and
the "Importance" flag is intended to tag character notes, or other notes, as for instance a main,
major or minor character.

Whether a document uses a "Status" or "Importance" flag depends on which root folder it lives in.
If it's in the :guilabel:`Novel` folder, it uses the "Status" flag, otherwise it uses an
"Importance" flag. Some folders, like :guilabel:`Trash` and :guilabel:`Archive` allow both.


.. _a_ui_tree_dnd:

Project Tree Drag & Drop
------------------------

The project tree allows drag & drop to a certain extent to allow you to reorder your documents and
folders. Moving a document in the project tree will affect the text's position when you assemble
your manuscript in the build tool.

Drag & drop has only limited support for moving documents. In general, bulk actions are not
allowed. This is deliberate to avoid accidentally messing up your project. If you make a mistake,
the last move action can be undone by pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`Shift`:kbd:`Z`.

Documents and their folders can be rearranged freely within their root folders. If you move a Novel
documents out of a Novel folder, it will be converted to a project note. Notes can be moved freely
between all root folders, but keep in mind that if you move a note into a :guilabel:`Novel` root
folder, its "Importance" setting will be switched with a "Status" setting. See
:ref:`a_ui_tree_status`. The old value will not be overwritten though, and should be restored if
you move it back at some point.

Root folders in the project tree cannot be dragged & dropped at all. If you want to reorder them,
you can move them up or down with respect to eachother from the arrow buttons at the top of the
project tree, or by pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`Shift` and the :kbd:`Up` or :kbd:`Down` key.


.. _a_ui_edit:

Editing and Viewing Documents
=============================

To edit a document, double-click it in the project tree, or press the :kbd:`Return` key while
having it selected. This will open the document in the document editor. The editor uses a
Markdown-like syntax for some features, and a novelWriter-specific syntax for others. The syntax
format is described in the :ref:`a_fmt` section.

The editor has a maximise button (toggles the :guilabel:`Focus Mode`) and a close button in the
top–right corner. On the top–left side you will find an edit button that opens the
:guilabel:`Item Label` dialog for the currently open document, and a search button to open the
search dialog.

Any document in the project tree can also be viewed in parallel in a right hand side document
viewer. To view a document, press :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`R`, or select :guilabel:`View Document` in the
menu or context menu. If you have a middle mouse button, middle-clicking on the document will also
open it in the viewer.

The document viewed does not have to be the same document as currently being edited. However, If
you *are* viewing the same document, pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`R` again will update the document
with your latest changes. You can also press the reload button in the top–right corner of the view
panel, next to the close button, to achieve the same thing.

Both the document editor and viewer will show the label of the document in the header at the top of
the edit or view panel. Optionally, the full project path to the document can be shown. This can be
set in :guilabel:`Preferences`.

.. tip::
   Clicking on the document title bar will select the document in the project tree and reveal its
   location, making it easier to locate in a large project.

Any tag reference in the editor can be opened in the viewer by moving the cursor to the label and
pressing :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`Return`. You can also control-click them with your mouse. In the viewer,
the references become clickable links. Clicking them will replace the content of the viewer with
the content of the document the reference points to.

The document viewer keeps a history of viewed documents, which you can navigate with the arrow
buttons in the top–left corner of the viewer. If your mouse has backward and forward navigation
buttons, these can be used as well. They work just like the backward and forward features in a
browser.

At the bottom of the view panel there is a :guilabel:`References` panel. (If it is hidden, click
the icon to reveal it.) This panel will show links to all documents referring back to the one
you're currently viewing, if any has been defined. The :guilabel:`Sticky` button will freeze the
content of the panel to the current document, even if you navigate to another document. This is
convenient if you want to quickly look through all documents in the list in the
:guilabel:`References` panel without losing the list in the process.

.. note::
   The :guilabel:`References` panel relies on an up-to-date index of the project. The index is
   maintained automatically. However, if anything is missing, or seems wrong, the index can always
   be rebuilt by selecting :guilabel:`Rebuild Index` from the :guilabel:`Tools` menu, or by
   pressing :kbd:`F9`.


.. _a_ui_edit_search:

Search & Replace
----------------

The document editor has a search and replace tool that can be activated with :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`F`
for search mode or :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`H` for search and replace mode.

Pressing :kbd:`Return` while in the search box will search for the next occurrence of the word, and
:kbd:`Shift`:kbd:`Return` for the previous. Pressing :kbd:`Return` in the replace box, will replace
the highlighted text and move to the next result.

There are a number of settings for the search tool available as toggle switches above the search
box. They allow you to search for, in order: matched case only, whole word results only, search
using regular expressions, loop search when reaching the end of the document, and move to the next
document when reaching the end. There is also a switch that will try to match the case of the word
when the replacement is made. That is, it will try to keep the word upper, lower, or capitalised to
match the word being replaced.

The regular expression search is somewhat dependant on which version of Qt your system has. If you
have Qt 5.13 or higher, there is better support for unicode symbols in the search.


.. _a_ui_edit_auto:

Auto-Replace as You Type
========================

A few auto-replace features are supported by the editor. You can control every aspect of the
auto-replace feature from :guilabel:`Preferences`. You can also disable this feature entirely if
you wish.

.. tip::
   If you don't like auto-replacement, all symbols inserted by this feature are also available in
   the :guilabel:`Insert` menu, and via convenient :ref:`a_kb_ins`. You may also be using a
   `Compose Key`_ setup, which means you may not need the auto-replace feature.

The editor is able to replace two and three hyphens with short and long dashes, triple points with
ellipsis, and replace straight single and double quotes with user-defined quote symbols. It will
also try to determine whether to use the opening or closing symbol, although this feature isn't
always accurate. Especially distinguishing between closing single quote and apostrophe can be
tricky for languages that use the same symbol for these, like English does.

.. tip::
   If the auto-replace feature changes a symbol when you did not want it to change, pressing
   :kbd:`Ctrl`:kbd:`Z` immediately after the auto-replacement will undo it without undoing the
   character you typed.


.. _a_ui_outline:

Project Outline View
====================

The project's Outline view is available as another view option from the views bar. The outline
provides an overview of the novel structure, displaying a tree hierarchy of the elements of the
novel, that is, the level 1 to 4 headings representing partitions, chapters, scenes and sections.

The document containing the heading can also be displayed as a separate column, as well as the line
number where it occurs. Double-clicking an entry will open the corresponding document in the
editor.

You can select which novel folder to display from the dropdown menu. You can optionally also choose
to show a combination of all novel folders.

.. note::
   Since the internal structure of the novel does not depend directly on the folder and document
   structure of the project tree, these will not necessarily look the same, depending on how you
   choose to organise your documents. See the :ref:`a_struct` page for more details.

Various meta data and information extracted from tags can be displayed in columns in the outline.
A default set of such columns is visible, but you can turn on or off more columns from the menu
button in the toolbar. The order of the columns can also be rearranged by dragging them to a
different position. You column settings are saved between sessions on a per-project basis.

.. note::
   The :guilabel:`Title` column cannot be disabled or moved.

The information viewed in the outline is based on the project's main index. While novelWriter does
its best to keep the index up to date when contents change, you can always rebuild it manually by
pressing :kbd:`F9` if something isn't right.

The outline view itself can be regenerated by pressing the refresh button. By default, the content
is refreshed each time you switch to this view.

The :guilabel:`Synopsis` column of the outline view takes its information from a specially
formatted comment. See :ref:`a_fmt_comm`.