John August

Highland

Go ahead and send happy support emails

Apps, Bronson, Highland, Weekend Read

Most of the support emails we get are about problems. Something isn’t working right, or is confusing, and a customer needs help.

Roughly once a week, we’ll get a support email that is, well, supportive. So I thought I’d single two of them them out, both to thank the users who took the time to write them and encourage everyone to tell developers when things are great.

Nabeel wrote in about [Weekend Read](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weekend-read/id502725173?mt=8):

> Hey just wanted to say I love your app. I read tons of screenplays and I was actually looking to re-download Final Draft Writer (what I bought an iPad for!) and your app also popped up alongside.

> I took a look and it was apparent that you guys have provided a solution to a problem I never realized I had: I hate reading screenplays in iBooks on the iPad! Keep it up guys.

> Btw, will you also provide a Mac version in the future?

Thank you, Nabeel!

We originally had plans for a Mac app called Weekend Read Assistant, which was designed to help load scripts onto your devices. With rise of iCloud Drive, that’s become much less necessary. You can simply drag scripts into the Weekend Read folder to automatically push them to all your devices. ((Nima Yousefi will hate that I said “automatically” because the process of getting scripts to sync is witchcraft that nearly killed him.))

folder screenshot

Sam wrote in about [Highland](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12):

> I’m sure you get this suggestion a million times a day, but I’ll still add my voice to the mix: Highland is a phenomenal app, and I would love to see an iPad version. I love that I can use any text editor to write something up in Fountain, but:
> A. Highland is just beautiful, and
> B. If I could easily sync between an iPad and a Mac, I’d consider that pretty dandy.

> Anyway, I know you probably hear that a lot, so I’ll at least leave you with this: you make a great app. A lot of stuff came up in my life that made me drift away from film for several years, but I’m finally coming back and trying to create something, and Highland has made it a real joy to re-immerse myself in doing creative work (and an affordable joy, at that).

> Thanks for your wonderful app.

Thank you, Sam!

We actually have Highland for iPad. It’s on my device right now.

We’ve had a working prototype of the app for more than a year. But the distance between an app that functions and one we’d be happy to ship is much greater than you’d imagine.

A huge part of that is expectation. Does Highland for iPad need to be able to do everything the Mac version does? Should it print? Should it email from within the app? Where should its files live? Does it use iCloud Drive?

My least favorite thing about the otherwise-terrific Ulysses apps is how files often fall out of sync — and it’s a much simpler text-editing app than Highland.

I also wonder if there’s enough money to be made on an iPad app. It’s hard to get real dollar figures on categories within the App Store, but my hunch is that by the time you get into the teens and twenties of the top-grossing productivity apps for iPad, you’re not seeing any real income.

So instead of an iPad version of Highland, we’re working on the next Mac version. That’s what I’m typing this in right now. We have no ETA, but I think you’re going to love it.

In the meantime, if you love an app — one of ours or someone else’s — I’d encourage you to take the time to tell the developer. In our case, every support email gets Slacked to the whole team, and we love virtual high-fives.

We also get notices for every app review. Leaving a positive review for Highland or Weekend Read or Bronson Watermarker lets us know you’re enjoying the app, and lets other App Store users know the app has fans.

Highland and Weekend Read get updates

Apps, Highland, Weekend Read

Our two major screenwriting apps have updates out this week, fixing minor bugs and annoyances.

[Highland 1.8.6](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12) fixes an issue where scene headers could get stuck on bold for some users. Highland offers application-wide preferences for whether scene headers should be double-spaced and/or bolded. Most screenwriters set it once and forget it.

[Weekend Read 1.5.1](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weekend-read/id502725173?mt=8) fixes a range of minor formating bugs reported by our users.

Both are available in their respective App Stores.

We already have a new build of Weekend Read in review with Apple to address a vulnerablity in the open-source AFNetworking code library. Despite the alarmist headlines (“1,500 iPhone apps have a serious flaw that hackers can easily exploit”), it’s highly unlikely users would ever encounter an issue within Weekend Read.

From [Ars Technica](http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/04/1500-ios-apps-have-https-crippling-bug-is-one-of-them-on-your-device/):

> To exploit the bug, attackers on a coffee shop Wi-Fi network or in another position to monitor the connection of a vulnerable device need only present it with a fraudulent secure sockets layer certificate.

The hypothetical coffee shop attacker could get access to network activity to and from Weekend Read — and only Weekend Read. What good would that be, exactly?

NIMA

Theoretically, they could see that you are downloading the script for Looper from the For Your Consideration list.

ME

That’ll make Rian Johnson happy. And I guess if you were sitting at Peets and you were downloading the top-secret screenplay for the next Avengers, someone could see that too. But I can guarantee you those scripts aren’t being emailed anywhere. And you probably shouldn’t be doing that on coffee-shop WiFi anyway.

NIMA

True.

ME

Could you push a script into someone’s library? Like, fake an iCloud sync event so that a new script shows up?

NIMA

That would be so hard but so cool.

ME

It’s the new breaking-in strategy. Hacker wanna-be screenwriters hang around coffee shops and wait for movie execs to come in and then they secretly load their scripts into Weekend Read. It’s like the Blackhat List.

NIMA

We should call Franklin Leonard. I think that’s a feature, not a bug.

Whichever it is, the AFNetwork issue will be closed in the next build.

You can find more information about [Highland](https://quoteunquoteapps.com/highland-2/) and [Weekend Read](https://quoteunquoteapps.com/weekendread/) on their sites.

Is automatic (cont’d) a bug or a feature?

Apps, Formatting, Highland

We got a question in the Highland support queue this morning that is less technical than philosophical:

> I started using Highland to finish a script I started in Final Draft.

> In Final Draft when a character speaks, then stops to do something physical, spots something, etc, then speaks again, a (CONT’D) is automatically added.

> When I finished writing the script in Highland I noticed that Highland does not add the (CONT’D) so I had half a script with (CONT’D) and half without it.

> In short I am curious is the (CONT’D) needed? Should I add it to what I wrote in Highland, or do I go back and remove it?

> I am going to submit this script to the Black List website, and am still an aspiring screenwriter. I personally think the (CONT’D) just takes up space, and understand why Highland doesn’t automatically add it, but wanted to get your opinion first.

> Many thanks. I love using Highland, and won’t be going back to Final Draft ever.

What he’s describing is automatic dialogue continuity, ((“Continued” can be noted as (CONT’D) or (cont’d). Both are fine. Pick one and stick with it.)) which is a source of no small amount of consternation to screenwriters. I wrote about it [back in 2010](http://johnaugust.com/2010/contd-vs-continuous), and that advice still holds true.

But my opinions have clearly influenced the direction of Highland, so it’s worth revisiting.

In some cases, you’ll absolutely want to use (cont’d) to indicate a character is still speaking. It’s a signal to the reader (and the actor) that the character is continuing the same thought, regardless of the intervening action.

An example:

TOM

(looking at his phone)

According to Dark Sky, a storm is coming in four minutes.

A tornado suddenly touches down, flipping over cars. Tom is oblivious.

TOM (CONT’D)

We should probably go inside.

In other cases, it’s much less clear whether dialogue continuity makes sense. If a bunch of action has occurred between the last time the character spoke, is it really correct or helpful to have that (cont’d)?

Consider Sandra Bullock’s character in Gravity. Minutes may elapse between her spoken dialogue, but Final Draft will default to adding the (cont’d) since no other character has spoken in the interim. You can delete the (cont’d), but it’s a hassle, and it will come right back if you reformat text around it.

With Highland, we made the decision not to do add the (cont’d) automatically. The screenwriter is always the best judge of whether the dialogue is continuous, so you can just type it yourself.

That’s sort of the philosophy of Highland and Fountain: your script is exactly what you type, nothing more, nothing less. If you want a (cont’d) there, it’s deliberate.

In recent editions of Highland, we’ve given users the option to have Highland automatically add (more) and (cont’d) at page breaks.

Again, I think that’s consistent with the Highland philosophy. The app is doing behind-the-scenes work to make the page look great, with algorithms to break dialogue at the period where possible, and squeeze in an extra line if necessary. This kind of (cont’d) only shows up if you really need it, so there’s no reason to bake it into the text itself.

On the subject of Highland, we have a [new release](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12) in the Mac App Store today. It fixes a bug that was preventing .fdx export.

Screenplays on the Kindle, 2015 edition

Follow Up, Formatting, Fountain, Geek Alert, Highland, How-To, Weekend Read

A screenwriter friend just emailed me to ask how she could get one of her scripts to look good on the Kindle. She had Googled and discovered I’d written about reading screenplays [on the Kindle](http://johnaugust.com/2009/the-kindle-is-not-good-for-screenplays) [twice](http://johnaugust.com/2009/reading-scripts-on-the-kindle) back in 2009. (I was an early Kindle adopter.)

Back in 2009, I found there to be a lot of potential for reading screenplays on the Kindle, but a lot of frustration.

Six years later, what’s changed?

Nothing. Kindles and screenplays are still a bad fit.

Attempting to get screenplays to look screenplay-like on Kindle is a fool’s errand, so let me actively dissuade you from trying. Down this path lies futility and despair.

## It’s not the Kindle’s fault.

Kindles are designed for free-flowing text like books. They don’t know anything about how screenplays work, and they will fight you at every step. We know. We tried. That’s a large part of why we made [Weekend Read](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/weekend-read/id502725173?mt=8).

If you’re starting with a PDF, the closest you can probably come on the Kindle is to run the script through [Highland](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/highland/id499329572?mt=12) and save it as a Fountain file. That’s just plain text, so if you then import it into Kindle’s parser, you’ll get a rough approximation, with everything set on the left margin:

INT. HOUSE – DAY

Mary and Tom carry in groceries.

TOM
They oughta call it, “Whole Paychec—

— THWACK! Tom is impaled by a spear.

CUT TO:

I write in [Fountain](http://fountain.io), so this looks fine to me. But that’s not what my friend was looking for. She wanted something like a printed screenplay, and you’re just not going to get that on the Kindle.

But you can get closer. If you dig into the text file and carefully set tags for character names and transitions, you can have them centered or moved to the right margin. Or you can bail on the screenplay formatting. Dave Trottier has [instructions](http://blog.liberwriter.com/2011/08/18/formatting-a-screenplay-for-kindle/) you can follow to make something that looks more like a published stage play. It’s incredibly tedious, but it’s possible.

With a lot of work, you can make something that looks okay — but only okay. That’s the best you’re going to get, and it’s not worth the effort. So in 2015, I use my Kindle for books and my iOS devices for screenplays. Each is the right tool for the job.