Print/Export created content.
 

If I create content in Realm Works, I would like a portable, printable version of my work to share with friends or to use or reference offline. Right now, I do my work in Word or Scrivener or Evernote or LibreOffice or FreeMind. With any one of those, I can print a document that I can put in a binder or on an E-Reader and work from there. As it stands, if I put all my work into Realm Works, I would have no way to take my work with me in a printed form. To do so, I would have to double my time and effort by maintaining two separate copies of my work in two separate formats, manually cloning changes in both products.

I've watched your videos, and the product looks great, so far. But I'm almost certain that many other people are going to want a feature to export their content to a printable form. It doesn't have to be in 1.0. People who have waited this long for your official release of 1.0 will wait longer for added features. I would guess that a well-designed export-to-document feature (Word, ODF, HTML, PDF, EPUB, something like that) will double or triple the usefulness and desirability of Realm Works.

For example, something even as basic as the following example would be very handy.

• TOPIC (People, Places, Things, etc)
  • <Object Name> (Person, Place, Thing)
    • Snippets
      • <Snippet 1> (full text, any links can be bold or underlined)
      • <Snippet 2> (same as above)
    • Relationships
      • <Relationship 1> (listed by name only, just for reference)
      • <Relationship 2> (same as above)

If the topic or object is a plot, you could have additional subheadings of:

• PLOTS
  • <Plot group>
    • <Plot Element, by name>
      • <Element Text/Snippet>
      • Preceded by: <Immediately previous element(s)> (Multiple elements can be comma delimited or listed as separate bullet points.)
      • Followed by: <Immediately following element(s)> (Multiple elements: same as above.)

But, that's just a suggestion to give you an idea of what I'm thinking in regards to my request.

What about all you other gamers? If I'm right, chime in, so they know.

Hey, everyone, I see I'm getting a lot of views, but no replies. If this feature is important to you, please reply, as the developers need to hear from you. If you don't speak up, they won't know, and if they don't know, they won't make this a priority.

If you have no interest in this feature, that's fine. Carry on. Otherwise, please let them know that this is a feature you would like.

Thanks.

I doubt you'll get much from the staff in the short term - they're currently pushing to get things nailed down to try for a pre-Christmas release. If you read through the progress notes Rob has been posting you'll find out about the remaining issues, and a number of features they already have scheduled for addition after v1.0 ships.

Included on the list is export capability. The current priority is getting data _into_ the system: once that's done (and some other features), they'll worry about getting data back out. Printing is . . . iffy, I'd say. They want to do it, and a lot of people want it, but formatting options for something this flexible make it significantly more difficult then we tend to think. My best guess is that in the nearer term they'll come up with an export solution, and leave it to the user to import into a word processor so they can format the results exactly as they wish.

So, forgive me if this is a stupid question, but where can I find the posting of progress notes?

Some of the monthly newsletters are available on the main website, and contain information on their progress. Also, you can use the Advanced Search capabilities to look only at the Upcoming Products section of the forum to limit your queries to the relevant forums. In the case of printing, one of the early hits has a response from Rob pointing back to the KickStarter comments where he made a more in-depth response.

I must apologize for not noticing that many of the update posts I've read are for the KickStarter backers. Much of the general information has been made public, but since there are multiple channels being used to communicate I suspect many of the more specific details haven't shown up everywhere, and I need to make sure that if I suggest "look it up" that it is as possible for you to do so it would be for me.

Still, I appreciate the info. Thank you for responding.

I am (as another user put it on another thread) over half a century old (btw, can't help resent the assumption that I am therefore not tech savvy), so you are probably thinking "Yeah, here comes someone who wants printing." If they provide that feature, I don't see me ever using it. Back in the pencil and paper days, the most frustrating thing was trying to keep track of all the reams of handouts. Hurray for the digital age! It is, in my opinion, far more useful to have hyperlinked information to bring up what you want, but that is just my two cents. If you can make the print-outs work, go for it. I was just never good enough (nor were my players) to figure out an organization scheme that actually worked.

Now what I do want is an xml export that can be wickered into Fantasy Grounds data module format (stand by, someone over 50 can code LUA!). That I'd really look forward to!

My dad will be eighty this May and he codes just fine, thank you very much...

I am both the one who made the "half a century old" comment and the one who wants the printing feature.

First off, all I meant by the age comment (and I'm not far behind him, BTW, just to clear that up. So I didn't mean any offense to anyone) was that given the ample opportunity he's had to show an interest in learning how to set up a server (especially with me as his friend), he never has, so he likely never will. I didn't mean that we wizened folk are incapable of using and learning about technology, just that we usually have our interests sorted out by this age. His are history, literature and writing.

Second, as far as printing, as much as I love computers and technology, sometimes I like to just sit in a library or a restaurant booth with a pad of paper and a pen. It'd be nice to be able to have my previously written materials handy without having to do double entry whenever I write something and double editing whenever I change something.

Hey, I am right there with you on the book, 8Bitz, but ever since I stareted playing and GMing on a computer, I'm done with paper.

OK, but that's not going to stop me from wanting the feature. :-)

I'm with you Bidmaron. Just make sure you have a back up! I lost years of GM notes when not only did my laptop HD crash but my T-byte BU died in the same week (690GB of data lost)! I missed my I.T. save and was dazed and slowed for three days (ugh)!

I use Google drive and Pogoplug cloud backup now. You get up to 5 gigs free and that is enough to back up my game notes. RW having a cloud will help with that (for RW data anyway) depending on the price.

Wow tragic. You know that is a good point. I feel secure in my backups, but if there was a fire or something like that, it wouldn't matter. I'm going to have to look into a cloud solution.

@Bigmaron - I've been using backblaze (http://www.backblaze.com) since I lost all my pre-graduate work long few years ago (back in 2001), and I've been happy with their service.

Thanks, gloranphile. That looks like a very workable solution.

+1 for printing/exporting please. Shouldn't be very hard with C#:)

I'm sure that I'm not alone in wanting to have a printed copy available.

Personally, I like to edit on paper when I'm working on something. I like that it gives me a different perspective holding a pen in my hand and marking up pages. I've had a computer since I was 12 and that is how I've always worked through high school, college and beyond until now, a year shy of the half-century mark: write, print, edit, update.

So, EightBitz, I do see value in being able to print/export as well (I also use Scrivener and Evernote). At the moment it's really the only thing that is keeping me from pushing the "Buy Now" button.

+1 Iam also chiming in on this one, because it describes how the layout could look like

Im one that does things digitally, but prefers printed for in game. Also there is nothing like handing out actual documents to specific players in game.

I was always under the belief that RealmsWorks would aid in that task.

+1 as well, please

I also want to highlight that it's very tedious to copy a table out of RW again, since the formating is no longer understood by most programs (office as well).

Hopefully the export function will be able to help with that in an easy way. Maybe it can be blocked for sold / official content

I'd also like to chime in that printing/exporting functionality is unarguably necessary.

You can get (some of) the formatting by pasting into Word first, then copying that into Excel.

thanks!

+1, I've stopped using Realmworks since a few months ago. Without an export option, the information just sitting there looks pretty but is too clunky to use in-game unless it's PbP. Waste of time to input it if I can't get it back out.

Seriously, Lone Wolf, this is dumb.

+1 to these. Printing and exporting are crucial!

Lonewolf- Please add printing functionality. That would truly place realmworks as the handsdown best campaign software on the market. +(infinity symbol)

Corona, please don't take this wrong, but what other software is there that even comes close to RW even without the printing?

Master plan comes to mind, BUT when RW achieves all it's goals it will be the standard by which all others are measured

I, too, would like some printing functionality. Something for encounters where I can have a printout of the description of the encounter, a listing of the creatures and the stat blocks that I have added for those creatures.

If those creatures have spells, printing out spell stat blocks would also be wonderful!

I too have left Realmworks behind for a lot of campaign work, my player groups really appreciate handouts. And the intimacy of talking and planning over a peice of paper rather than crouched behind a screen.

Asked them about this at GenCon. Doesn't look good. Bummer though. Other than a few interface issues, this thing is great.

What makes you say this? What were you told and by whom?

There's no reason that I'm aware of for anyone on the team to have said something that should have led you to this conclusion. So please enlighten me.

Sure. This was my experience.

When asked about if/when printing/exporting was being added, the reps didn't give a date or an explanation. Instead they merely told me that Lonewolf had a forum to request such a feature be added. Since this thread has been going on since launch, and the rep didn't have a canned statement says to me that this is on an indefinite timeline. So definitely not a priority.

I'd like to be optimistic, but this sounds like at least 6 more months.

That *IS* the "canned statement". It's the exact same thing we stated in the July newsletter and here on the forums a few weeks ago. Please see the link below for the complete details:
http://www.wolflair.com/news/newslet...2014/#rwfuture

I'm not sure how you translated that answer into "at least 6 more months", especially if you're being optimistic. If you had asked "When will Realm Works solve world hunger?" or absolutely any other "when will" question, the answer would have been the same. :) We are focused on Player Edition right now. Once that's done, we'll be determining what's next, and the Feature Requests threads will be a strong influence in that process.

We have one more Beta release planned for Player Edition in the upcoming days. It's our hope that this will be the last Beta release and we can shortly get Player Edition out the door. After that, we can start figuring out what's next.

I also would like an export function, so I can generate handouts. But no stress... i Would also like a working calendar and to get the repository..... So many things in which way RealmWorks will help me..... :)

Wow. Sorry I brought it up.

I could give two ***** about the players edition, the market place or web based player access.when i am done inputing my campaign I want to be able to export certain sections for offline use as my group will not be using the players edition of realmworks as we already have a solution for our presentation needs. So please Just give it to me straight are we ever getting printing and exporting if so can you even give a vague timeline on when so there is little speculation.

Dervish - I dont work for LWD, but I can say that a comment like that isnt likely to change the answer Rob gave. He, and the rest of the team, will be deciding whats next after the players version is complete.

The vagueness is neccesarry, i imagine, because at this point, they havent 100% decided which feature is next, and they are going to basis it, at least somewhat, based on the feature request thread.

Also, I dont think Rob at any point, or anyone from LWD, has ever said that wearent getting printing.

But lets say, Rob said, 'ok 2 months'. But then after a meeting they realized that the Feature Requests had made printing actually the third most requested feature. Should he stick to his answer and upset a greater portion of clients, or should he do the items that are more requested, and thus his vague answer would be completely off. And that would look worse.

I think their answers have been completely fair.

I know, I for one want printing, but would be VERY annoyed if Rob said 'ok, its next' and then pushed it back behind 2 or 3 other items. Id rather wait till after the player version comes out and hopefully LWD will put together a more definite plan of the next most important items.

Yeah, I sympathize with LWD regarding the difficulty of balancing features against available man hours.

I haven't followed the other feature request threads closely, because the software is fine as-is for me, except for the lack of print/export-- which is preventing me from using it. Therefore there might be a much more pressing issue that I'm ignorant of.

From my perspective (and I don't mean to sound be inflammatory), this is more a request to fix something functionally broken, than a feature request. I've never used a piece of software in which you input content, but are unable to re-purpose that content via print or export.