Guides on Draft Bench

I want to start a writing project from scratch

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You’re starting fresh in Draft Bench - no existing Scrivener bundle to import. By the end of this you’ll have a structured project with chapters and scenes, ready to open a scene and start writing.

What you’ll need
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Draft Bench enabled (Settings -> Community plugins -> Draft Bench).
A project title in mind. Working titles are fine; you can rename later.

Steps
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1. Create the project
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From the command palette, run Draft Bench: Create project. The new-project modal opens with three fields:

I want to import a Scrivener project

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You’re moving a Scrivener 3 project across to Draft Bench. The importer reads your .scriv bundle and rebuilds the binder hierarchy as a Draft Bench project: chapters, scenes, sub-scenes, RTF bodies translated to markdown, statuses and labels and custom metadata routed to frontmatter, and (optionally) per-document snapshots as drafts. By the end you’ll have a Draft Bench project sitting in your vault that mirrors what you had in Scrivener.

What you’ll need
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A Scrivener 3 .scriv project bundle (Mac or Windows). Scrivener 2 and the iOS Scrivener bundle format aren’t supported.
The bundle copied into your Obsidian vault folder. The importer reads from inside the vault; it won’t reach external paths.
10-30 minutes for a typical novel-sized project; longer if you’re importing snapshots.

Steps
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1. Get the `.scriv` folder into your vault
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You have three options. Pick whichever your platform supports:

I want to work with drafts of a scene

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You’ve written a scene and you want to revise it without losing what’s there. A draft in Draft Bench is an archived snapshot of the scene’s current state, written to its own markdown file. The source scene note carries the prose forward; you keep revising, the snapshot stays put. By the end of this you’ll have created a draft of a scene, found it in the vault, and confirmed the source scene is ready for the next pass.

I want to compile my manuscript

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You have a Draft Bench project with content - chapters, scenes, maybe sub-scenes - and you want to produce a manuscript file you can share. The Manuscript Builder is where this happens. By the end you’ll have a compile preset configured, a live preview verifying it looks right, and an exported file (Markdown, DOCX, PDF, or ODT) sitting in your vault.

What you’ll need
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A Draft Bench project with at least one scene that has content. Empty scenes compile to empty sections; you’ll see them in Preview.
5-10 minutes for a first compile. Subsequent compiles of the same preset are one click.

Steps
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1. Open the Manuscript Builder
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Three ways in:

I want to view my project in a Bases table

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

You have a Draft Bench project with several scenes (and maybe chapters and drafts) and you want to browse the structure as a queryable table instead of file-tree only. Draft Bench ships three starter Bases that surface common views over your project’s notes. By the end of this you’ll have the starter Bases installed, opened a Scenes view, switched between its built-in views, and embedded a Base inside a project note so it auto-filters to that project.

Guides on Draft Bench

I want to start a writing project from scratch

What you’ll need #

Steps #

1. Create the project #

I want to import a Scrivener project

What you’ll need #

Steps #

1. Get the .scriv folder into your vault #

I want to work with drafts of a scene

I want to compile my manuscript

What you’ll need #

Steps #

1. Open the Manuscript Builder #

I want to view my project in a Bases table

What you’ll need
#

Steps
#

1. Create the project
#

What you’ll need
#

Steps
#

1. Get the `.scriv` folder into your vault
#

What you’ll need
#

Steps
#

1. Open the Manuscript Builder
#