I love the way Scrivener lets you chuck all sorts of document types into a project. I fill up my projects with all sorts of stuff from notes to self to huge reams of Web pages and found pdfs. Then I use various methods to refer to them or to copy bits into the Draft, depending on what I’m writing. Split screen is a gem.

However – when  a project gets big and accumulates large quantities of reference material I start to fear that I will lose crucial documents. I’m not the best at filing systems and I do tend to confuse myself. What I like to do is keep the reference document next to the relevant part while I’m working on it. In the old days this was the equivalent of using a paperclip in a ring binder. Scrivener, for various reasons, doesn’t let you import documents into the Draft (writing) folder and even if it did it would make a hell of a mess of the output each time you compiled.

Now I’ve worked out my own method of keeping reference material in the writing folder but not messing up the documents that I generate along the way (I tend to compile outlines with synopses as I go and print them for reference. So shoot me.). What I do is make and mark ‘non-compile’ documents into which I paste the relevant data.

1. Create a Label for Research files

In the Inspector create a new Label (drop down the menu, last choice is ‘Edit…’). Give it a colour that separates it from the other Labels. Each time you create a Research file in the Manuscript folder, apply this Label to it and uncheck the ‘Include in Compile’ checkbox. This will stop this file from being included when you generate output.

2. Applly this Label to files in the Binder

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here I’ve used a grey colour so it stands out. I’ve also indented them by putting them inside the document above, though this is not necessary, especially if you want to move them around. (The other colours mark different types and stages of files).

3. Put whatever content you want in your Research files

 

You can cut and paste anything in here, from the Research section or direct from the Web.