New in Ellipsus: Q3 2024

Folders, notifications, search, and more. Collaborating on large-scale projects in Ellipsus is easier than ever.

Since July, we've been focused on making it easier to navigate your workspace, manage large-scale projects, and collaborate with other writers.

Written by

Kate Donahue

Publish date: 19/08/2024

Better project organization

Like any beta product, Ellipsus has had its share of (manageable) scaling issues. The most pressing one is that people are writing a lot in Ellipsus, and typically working on very long works. While this is undoubtedly A Good Problem, it does create some frustrations around finding, loading, and sharing your work.

Our latest features make it easier to work on any type of project in Ellipsus.

Store documents in folders (and subfolders)

Whether you're focused on serialized works published to AO3 or a single book-length piece supplemented by lots of research, folders can make your work much more manageable. (Not to be hyperbolic, but in the week it's been live for the Ellipsus team it's changed my entire life.)

Any folders you create can contain an unlimited number of documents and subfolders, so you can set them up in any way that works for you, such as:

Separating research, outlines, and world-building materials from the documents that will store your final work.
Storing your personal templates, like character sheets and world-building sheets.
Representing different stages in your workflow, like drafting, beta reading, and published.
Archiving older documents, or ideas you want to (eventually!) circle back to.

You can learn more about creating folders and moving your documents here.

Search document names

The other challenge that comes from having so many documents is trying to find them without tons of clicking and scrolling.

At the start of July, we added the ability to search for document names. Using the search field at the top of your dashboard, you can search all your documents (and folders!) as well as documents shared with you.

More options for sharing and collaboration

Whenever we make a change in Ellipsus, we ask ourselves: Does this keep our writers in control? Whether it's styling text or managing drafts, we want writers to feel like they have the final say over their work—and that's even more important when it comes to how work is shared with others.

Choose whether links are private or view-only

When we first entered beta, Ellipsus documents could be viewed by anyone with the link. Now, all links are private by default, giving you an extra level of security before choosing to share your work.

If you want to enable view-only sharing, you can open Share and export to adjust your settings. Even with view-only access, links only go where you (and your collaborators) share them, and they're never indexed by search engines.

Stay on top of updates in the notification center

If you're collaborating across multiple documents, it can be difficult to stay on top of new activity without sneaking back to your email inbox.

Now, you keep tabs on what's happening right from our notification center, available from your dashboard and editor. Currently, we send notifications about new document invites, comments, and replies. With this change, you also have more control over which notifications (if any) are sent as emails.

You can learn more about Ellipsus notifications here.

Plus other updates, improvements, and fixes

We shipped a new website! Now, if you recommend Ellipsus to a friend, they'll be able to see a preview before they sign up. (Plus, we scrapped our scribbly Quentin font, so all text on the site is more legible.)
Writing on smaller laptops or tablets wasn't always so pleasant. Now, the editor layout is more responsive, and the right-hand panel should never cover your text.
Sometimes the editor would randomly reload while writing, moving your cursor to a new position. Irritating, we know. Happily, the dreaded Whoopsie Doodle (iykyk) has been vanquished.
Debugging issues is a little bit easier. Now you can download your console logs and stored data from the settings page and send them to us via in-app chat.