#paragraphs — Public Fediverse posts

The #disasterrecovery #document has been published. And thanks to #Emacs #orgmode #export to #opendocumenttext, I found the process of updating #style far more tolerable than if it were all #wysiwyg.

But really, can our company document #template, which I am trying to #imitate, please use a #serif #font for the body text? Please? Yeah, #TimesNewRoman is kinda #basic but at least it works well in #paragraphs. I can’t #sansserif for 47 pages straight.

The #disasterrecovery #document has been published. And thanks to #Emacs #orgmode #export to #opendocumenttext, I found the process of updating #style far more tolerable than if it were all #wysiwyg.

But really, can our company document #template, which I am trying to #imitate, please use a #serif #font for the body text? Please? Yeah, #TimesNewRoman is kinda #basic but at least it works well in #paragraphs. I can’t #sansserif for 47 pages straight.

Does anyone have experience with a #Drupal + #media + #paragraphs setup where content editors (not site builders) can choose a crop type or image style or even view mode for referenced media images?

Use case:
- editor selects 1-column layout, selects media item, selects horizontal crop type.
- editor selects 2-column layout, selects media item, selects vertical crop type.

Got lost yesterday trying to combine All The Crop Modules; I need to start from scratch.

Any thoughts?

If you're going to deploy a #MarkDown #editor in your web app, at least have the common courtesy to insert a #separation between #paragraphs! Otherwise you're going to force people to insert blank paragraphs which just fucks everything up.

Seriously. The lack of proper #paragraph #handling in markdown #editors is frustrating.

If you're going to deploy a #MarkDown #editor in your web app, at least have the common courtesy to insert a #separation between #paragraphs! Otherwise you're going to force people to insert blank paragraphs which just fucks everything up.

Seriously. The lack of proper #paragraph #handling in markdown #editors is frustrating.

If you're going to deploy a #MarkDown #editor in your web app, at least have the common courtesy to insert a #separation between #paragraphs! Otherwise you're going to force people to insert blank paragraphs which just fucks everything up.

Seriously. The lack of proper #paragraph #handling in markdown #editors is frustrating.

#grammarly will help #students reword #paragraphs to make it fit better.
Another way to put this is #cheating.

Students will leave #school, #college, #university unable to attain the level they have qualifications for without a #digital crutch.

#Society is being driven to a state where few people can think for themselves.

#Teach them first. Enable them to do it themselves. Later, provide #digitaltools
BUT
they'll have #skills to fall back on.

@evshift

WTF somebody teach these people about #paragraphs

You need to be a very specialized #lawyer to even partially understand the millions and billions of #copyright #law #paragraphs these days, so only the #corporations can take advantage, while everybody else can get squeezed by it - when the corporations apply it on them. 😋

In #today's Denver Post: Clarence Thomas must recuse himself before Feb 8 oral arguments begin w Supreme Court. Ginni's for-profit political consulting firm will benefit from another Tr^mp term, she helped orchestrate the "Stop the Steal" rally, & pressured lawmakers to overturn a free & fair election.
#last #two #paragraphs #feel the #burn #Clarence #Thomas #plans to #overturn #Colorado #supreme #court & #legitimize #trump on the #ballot #SCOTUS is a #bought #court https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/30/clarence-thomas-recuse-himself-colorado-trump-case-ballot-14th-amendment/

In #today's Denver Post: Clarence Thomas must recuse himself before Feb 8 oral arguments begin w Supreme Court. Ginni's for-profit political consulting firm will benefit from another Tr^mp term, she helped orchestrate the "Stop the Steal" rally, & pressured lawmakers to overturn a free & fair election.
#last #two #paragraphs #feel the #burn #Clarence #Thomas #plans to #overturn #Colorado #supreme #court & #legitimize #trump on the #ballot #SCOTUS is a #bought #court https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/30/clarence-thomas-recuse-himself-colorado-trump-case-ballot-14th-amendment/

In #today's Denver Post: Clarence Thomas must recuse himself before Feb 8 oral arguments begin w Supreme Court. Ginni's for-profit political consulting firm will benefit from another Tr^mp term, she helped orchestrate the "Stop the Steal" rally, & pressured lawmakers to overturn a free & fair election.
#last #two #paragraphs #feel the #burn #Clarence #Thomas #plans to #overturn #Colorado #supreme #court & #legitimize #trump on the #ballot #SCOTUS is a #bought #court https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/30/clarence-thomas-recuse-himself-colorado-trump-case-ballot-14th-amendment/

In #today's Denver Post: Clarence Thomas must recuse himself before Feb 8 oral arguments begin w Supreme Court. Ginni's for-profit political consulting firm will benefit from another Tr^mp term, she helped orchestrate the "Stop the Steal" rally, & pressured lawmakers to overturn a free & fair election.
#last #two #paragraphs #feel the #burn #Clarence #Thomas #plans to #overturn #Colorado #supreme #court & #legitimize #trump on the #ballot #SCOTUS is a #bought #court https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/30/clarence-thomas-recuse-himself-colorado-trump-case-ballot-14th-amendment/

In #today's Denver Post: Clarence Thomas must recuse himself before Feb 8 oral arguments begin w Supreme Court. Ginni's for-profit political consulting firm will benefit from another Tr^mp term, she helped orchestrate the "Stop the Steal" rally, & pressured lawmakers to overturn a free & fair election.
#last #two #paragraphs #feel the #burn #Clarence #Thomas #plans to #overturn #Colorado #supreme #court & #legitimize #trump on the #ballot #SCOTUS is a #bought #court https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/30/clarence-thomas-recuse-himself-colorado-trump-case-ballot-14th-amendment/

The #Most #Frightening #Part of the #Trump #Indictment.

Buried in the #federal #indictment of #DonaldTrump on four #counts tied to his attempt to #overturn the #results of the 2020 #presidential #election is one of the most #chilling #paragraphs ever #written about the #plans and #intentions of an #sitting #AmericanPresident.

#Women #Transgender #LGBTQ #LGBTQIA #Conservatives #Extremism #Fascism #RepublicanParty #Hate #Bigotry #Violence

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/04/opinion/trump-indictment-jeffrey-clark-insurrection-act.html

@allisonwyss @orionkidder @joehumphrey

[R]eaders really do need breaks! And they like breaks! And sometimes it means they come back to the story even more ready for it.

Not disagreeing, but I believe it important to force readers to choose.

I don't often stop reading a story never to pick it up again, but one thing -- other than it being a really bad story -- that will make me stop reading is a writer resolving stuff before a chapter break. Given a choice of stopping, I might.

Stop.

Permanently.

This stuff I'm discussing here I don't do consciously, I'll admit. This is an analysis of my writing. I'm an unabashed pantster, under the spell of loquacious characters living their lives breathlessly, barreling along toward their destiny (writing toward a known ending). I throw breaks when it feels right, but not after plot or character resolution!

Except... After the climax or denouement (penultimate chapter), and again at the end of the epilogue (end of story).

For me, some of what flags that I can chapter break is a sense of mystery, foreboding the character might be doing the wrong thing, or a cliffhanger in the action that will proceed subsequently at another time or place. Something to be curious about.

#writers #WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations #writingTeacherConversations #fiction #writing

@allisonwyss @whatzaname @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I don't break, the characters and action does. I do it only rarely, and only when it feels right. It's always a sprint not exactly a marathon, but the reader is welcome to grab a bottle of water before jumping back into the race.

In the context of the current 130K novel, one chapter wants to be like this and it's 10K. It goes from MC and love interest, each of who are competing for control, feeling a weird synergy (love, [spoilers], or both?), to dinner, dancing, desserts, and asking about his "etchings", to... uh, hem. The next chapter is the greatest mystery of the whole book, and is 600 words long.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @whatzaname @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I don't break, the characters and action does. I do it only rarely, and only when it feels right. It's always a sprint not exactly a marathon, but the reader is welcome to grab a bottle of water before jumping back into the race.

In the context of the current 130K novel, one chapter wants to be like this and it's 10K. It goes from MC and love interest, each of who are competing for control, feeling a weird synergy (love, [spoilers], or both?), to dinner, dancing, desserts, and asking about his "etchings", to... uh, hem. The next chapter is the greatest mystery of the whole book, and is 600 words long.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @whatzaname @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I don't break, the characters and action does. I do it only rarely, and only when it feels right. It's always a sprint not exactly a marathon, but the reader is welcome to grab a bottle of water before jumping back into the race.

In the context of the current 130K novel, one chapter wants to be like this and it's 10K. It goes from MC and love interest, each of who are competing for control, feeling a weird synergy (love, [spoilers], or both?), to dinner, dancing, desserts, and asking about his "etchings", to... uh, hem. The next chapter is the greatest mystery of the whole book, and is 600 words long.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @Trajecient @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I am at my best in chaptering or naming the books/parts of a novel, the title is always a mystery to be solved by the time you reach the end of the chapter or part. Sometimes I even do that with the title of the novel. Moreover, I like it when the cover art is a scene from the novel you have to look for, also, not merely something evocative of the spirit of the work (tho that's advertising for the publisher and you're lucky if you get consulted).

This are things that engage me when I find them, so I also do them in my stories.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @Trajecient @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I am at my best in chaptering or naming the books/parts of a novel, the title is always a mystery to be solved by the time you reach the end of the chapter or part. Sometimes I even do that with the title of the novel. Moreover, I like it when the cover art is a scene from the novel you have to look for, also, not merely something evocative of the spirit of the work (tho that's advertising for the publisher and you're lucky if you get consulted).

This are things that engage me when I find them, so I also do them in my stories.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @Trajecient @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I am at my best in chaptering or naming the books/parts of a novel, the title is always a mystery to be solved by the time you reach the end of the chapter or part. Sometimes I even do that with the title of the novel. Moreover, I like it when the cover art is a scene from the novel you have to look for, also, not something evocative (tho that's advertising for the publisher and you're lucky if you get consulted).

This are things that engage me when I find them, so I also do them in my stories.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @Trajecient @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I am at my best in chaptering or naming the books/parts of a novel, the title is always a mystery to be solved by the time you reach the end of the chapter or part. Sometimes I even do that with the title of the novel. Moreover, I like it when the cover art is a scene from the novel you have to look for, also, not merely something evocative of the spirit of the work (tho that's advertising for the publisher and you're lucky if you get consulted).

This are things that engage me when I find them, so I also do them in my stories.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@allisonwyss @Trajecient @orionkidder @joehumphrey When I am at my best in chaptering or naming the books/parts of a novel, the title is always a mystery to be solved by the time you reach the end of the chapter or part. Sometimes I even do that with the title of the novel. Moreover, I like it when the cover art is a scene from the novel you have to look for, also, not something evocative (tho that's advertising for the publisher and you're lucky if you get consulted).

This are things that engage me when I find them, so I also do them in my stories.

#writers #writing #writingAdvice #writerTeacherConversations
#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

@joehumphrey @orionkidder @allisonwyss

[difference between] storytelling and story time?

CW: tM;dr? (Too Meta, Didn't Read?) 😋​

I really want to make story time one word, but that would be overloading another word used in the context of reading to children.

Both words are a meta concept.

Storytelling is how you communicate the events and ideas of the story. Story time is how you communicate how time passes in the story.

Story time can be:

• Textual, as in, "After dragging the all the stupid bricks up the hill," or "I kept on looking up from the book at the clock, my muscles twitching, as the second hand barely ticked toward noon."

• A description that requires more attention by the reader, slowing them down, or so concisely powerful it thrills and speeds them up.

• Some dialogue of multiple characters breathlessly interrupting each other, or droning on and on.

• Or... it could be a blank centered line with a # or a ##, a chapter break, or a novel composed of multiple books. I'll quote Allison responding to Orion:

Pause and consider--that's perfect. I think sometimes metafictional moments inside text do the same thing. As do other sorts of breaks.

• Others (definitely).

I recently wrote a novel that consisted of four books (180K total). Each book started with a cliffhanger chapter about the situation where the next book begins and the current ends. The rest of each "book" that followed all leading up to that cliffhanger/resolution book transition. Such things messes with how the reader perceives time passing in the story. FYI, one book starts with a fertilizer bomb about to explode. How the MC got herself into that one drives you to the end of that book!

Before you cry foul, I've recently watched a number of dramas that use this same 1-2-3 format: cliffhanger hook, story to the cliffhanger, then cliffhanger resolution transition to next episode. It works well for #mystery and #thriller genres. The last was a Korean gothic romance titled, "It's Okay to Not Be Okay." Excellent, by the way. I highly recommend it.

This is why I call story time perceptual manipulation, though, of course, storytelling does make you hallucinate being somewhere you are not, so it qualifies as perceptual manipulation, also.

#writers #WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations #writingTeacherConversations #fiction #writing #time #perception

@orionkidder @joehumphrey @allisonwyss Very interesting topics in this thread. I realize I am late to it, but a few things:

Workshops actually can be great! There's just a lot that can also go wrong.

This is very true. When I saw a person reduced to tears, I started prefacing critiques with: A critique is what one person wanted to say having read your story and thinking about your words. Some or none of it may be applicable or make sense, or they have missed the point entirely. It's only what they understood. You are under no obligation to accept any of it.

How do you think about chapters?

• Cliffhangers.
• A breaking point that a reader could choose to ignore.
• A way of organizing a story into comprehensible chunks.

Mine are usually at least 750 words long, but some are 10K.

Sometimes, with novelettes or short novellas, I have no chapter breaks and let the story run breathlessly to the end. I'm thinking of one that took place over about a week, and even dreams played a part. This is the experience of the character in a ticking clock situation of a corrupting curse who needs to win over a hostile individual that could beat her and take over as ruler.

The examples I’ve seen of anarchist texts that allegedly don’t tell you what conclusions to draw from the text are either incoherent or deeply manipulative.

It sounds like it would be either incoherent or steam of consciousness slice of life stories. You can learn something from wandering, if directed I suppose. I did like My Dinner with Andre. That I learned something is the highest praise I can give a story.

That said, I do have one novel that in the end I've carefully crafted the main character to be either mentally ill (hearing voices) or to be a actual shaman who speaks to spirits. I make sure nothing she learns couldn't have been deduced, though you'd have to be a careful reader. It's up to the reader to sit back with the book and decide which they're more comfortable with... in a hard science fiction book to boot.

#writers #WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations #writingTeacherConversations #fiction #writing

A client has me thinking about chapters.

Chapters can feel essayistic (coving a topic) or episodic (covering an event). Some writers care most about their length.

I consider their shape & how they make patterns & how the breaks influence a reader's experience.

They're kind of arbitrary like paragraphs--which is fun.

How do you think about chapters?

#WritingCommunity #WritingCraft #AmWriting #AmEditing #WritersofMastodon #Writing #WritingCraft #Chapters #Paragraphs #WritingConversations

We have #markdown #paragraphs!

https://github.com/marmota-app/marmdown/commit/7b6d1b562d9a5b39534710564eaba5994d40533c

@scifijack

In 9th Grade English, we had to write weekly one page descriptions - different topic each week. By year end, my writing sang!!!

Fabulous exercise!

#writing #words #paragraphs
#writingdiscipline

A shout out to #writers everywhere - today I realized that I’m 8000 words away from finishing the #book I’m writing, the one that got slowed down by #covid and the #pandemic & I just want to say it feels good to remember that it’s all really just a grind, one word that becomes two words, that turn into #sentences, that become #paragraphs and #pages. Also if you ever feel called to write about a weird book about hygiene and federal bureaucracy and the department of agriculture? Don’t. #histodons