integrated WYSIWYG editor for interactive story script

[Iris]

EDIT: Perhaps my original post (as quoted below) wasn't very clear to the casual reader. So since a picture is worth a thousand words, here's a screenshot - click on it for the real thing:



The same system as is used for the ILSS and WRISS - only with a fancy editor so it's easy to format entries, or you can paste in pre-formatted text from your word processor.

Hi-

I used to use the same interactive story script for the Faramir Interactive Story. I replaced it with the current wiki for a number of reasons, one of them (be it a minor one), the fact that users need to have HTML knowledge in order to format their work.

Even though it's never been used at our site, I have experimented with integrating a WYSIWYG editor (='what you see is what you get' editor) into this script you also use.
See the results here.
Or go straight to an entry form.

The toolbar you see is the default toolbar - it's possible to customize these to only include the buttons you want. I never bothered because I already decided to move away from this script.

This script in not currently used for the Faramir Interactive Story, and only holds a handful of chapters. Feel free to experiment.

Hope I'm not treading on anyone's toes- just thought it may be something you'd also find worth considering.

- iris

[Gabby]

What i like about the script the ILSS is using over the wiki, is that the outline displays the chapter titles (which are often a piece of creatity in their own right) instead of the branch points, and the outline only displays the chapters that have actually been written. I do see some advantages(and pitfalls) to the wiki- the # one being the editability of the chappies- by anyone come to think about it. Have you considered possibly allowing authors to leave more than one branch point however? Why limit it to two?

[Calenharn Elflover]

Have you considered possibly allowing authors to leave more than one branch point however? Why limit it to two?

Now there's an interesting suggestion...

[Guest]

What i like about the script the ILSS is using over the wiki, ...

I didn't mean to start a discussion on wiki vs interactive story script here.
I'm not suggesting anyone should switch over to a wiki, and we're certainly not going back to the interactive story script.

What I was showcasing was the WYSIWYG editor in the interactive story script - which is very easy to add.

[Guest]

Have you considered possibly allowing authors to leave more than one branch point however? Why limit it to two?

Now there's an interesting suggestion...

Yes, most certainly haveconsidered that. Also, you can think of things like entering a branch point in the middle of a very long chapter.

But again, I don't think anyone here would be interested in switching to a wiki, nor are we switching back to the interactive story script. The pros and cons of a wiki is not the discussion I wanted to raise here.

I just thought the addition of the WYSIWYG editor to the interactive story script was something worth considering for any site that uses it. Makes life easier for the people who are contributing chapters.

[Iris]

If no one's interested, maybe it's better if Esteliel or someone else with the right authorization removes this topic altogether?

Sorry, guess I poked my nose in where it didn't belong. Or everyone here learnt their HTML by now...

[Esteliel]

I think it's a very nice idea, but I want to keep the Interactive Stories easy to read, so most of the options that taskbar offers would be unneccessary.

Actually, I think the only formatting options that are needed here are italics and bolding of text. Using a taskbar just to offer these two options would be overdoing it, I think.

But anyway, thanks for the offer!

[Iris]

I think it's a very nice idea, but I want to keep the Interactive Stories easy to read, so most of the options that taskbar offers would be unneccessary.

Yes, I totally agree nobody'd want to see people mucking about with multiple font faces or colours.

Still, sometimes readability can be helped by good formatting (for example, I've seen people use tables for Elvish to English translations; I personally like to use indents for quoting from letters and such, and IMO there's nothing like a clean-and-simple horizontal rule for section breaks), but true, all these things can be easily hand coded.

And yet, having to use HTML was the biggest complaint I got about the Interactive Story script. It was certainly not my biggest problem with it (or the reason why I dumped it), because as you can see, it was easily fixed with just two lines of code.
But if this isn't an issue for your users, then carry on and never mind me!