Outline View
The Canvas Outline view displays your story structure as a collapsible tree with progress bars, status badges, and entity pills — giving you an at-a-glance view of your entire project's health.
When to Use Canvas Outline vs. Writing Outline
Proseweave has two outline views that serve different purposes:
Writing Outline (⌘1) | Canvas Outline | |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Build and edit your structure | Visualize and review your structure |
| What you do | Add/edit/reorder acts, chapters, scenes, beats | Filter, scan progress, jump to scenes |
| Best for | Planning and structuring | Tracking progress and spotting gaps |
Use the Writing Outline when you're building your story structure. Use the Canvas Outline when you want to review how far along you are, filter by character or status, or navigate to a specific scene quickly.
Structure
The tree follows the hierarchy Act → Chapter → Scene:
- Act headers show the act title, total word count, and scene count
- Chapter rows show the chapter title, word count, and scene count
- Scene cards show title, status badge, beat text, entity pills, and word count
Click the chevron on any act or chapter to collapse or expand it. Use the Expand All / Collapse All buttons at the top to toggle everything at once. Collapse state is saved per project.
Progress Bars
Each act header includes a horizontal progress bar showing the breakdown of scene statuses:
| Status | Color |
|---|---|
| Outline | Slate |
| Draft | Blue |
| Revision | Amber |
| Final | Emerald |
The bar width for each segment is proportional to the number of scenes in that status. This makes it easy to see at a glance which acts are mostly drafted, which are still in outline, and which are nearing completion.
Scene Cards
Scene cards display:
- Status badge — colored pill in the top-right corner
- Beat — the scene's narrative beat (what needs to happen)
- Entity pills — characters, settings, and worldbuilding entries linked to the scene
- Word count — current word count
Click a scene card to navigate directly to that scene in the Manuscript editor.
Filtering
The sidebar filter panel (status, character, setting) controls which scenes are visible. Filtered-out scenes are hidden — acts and chapters with no matching scenes collapse automatically.
Example use cases:
- Filter by character to see every scene where a specific character appears
- Filter by Outline status to find scenes that still need prose
- Filter by setting to check how often a location is used
Analysis Highlighting
When the Story Analysis panel is open, clicking an issue auto-expands the relevant act and chapter and scrolls to the highlighted scene with an amber ring. This connects analysis results directly to your outline for quick navigation.