AI writing tools

These tools are there only when Enable AI features is on in Settings. With it off, none of them shows anywhere in FoxQuill.

Everything here runs against the server you set up on the AI setup page. Nothing leaves your computer unless you pointed FoxQuill at a server that is not on it.

In the editor#

Continue and outline#

Type / in a scene and pick /continue or /outline.

/continue writes on from where the cursor is. Set the Length to 100, 200, or 300 words, and set Versions to 1, 2, or 3. With more than one, FoxQuill asks the model that many times in a row and numbers the results. Pick a version to read it, then press Use on the one you want.

/outline proposes what could happen next as a short list. Use adds it to the scene where the cursor is. Keep in notes saves it as a note on this scene.

/summarize writes a summary of the scene and shows it first. It only replaces the scene’s summary when you press Use. The Summarize button above a scene does the same. If the AI is not set up, pressing it says “AI is not set up. Set it up in Settings.”

Tools on selected text#

Select some words. A small toolbar appears. Press the AI tools button.

Describe answers with three to five short lines, each one concrete thing the point-of-view character would notice, using only the senses that matter. A last line starting “Like:” gives one comparison from that character’s own world. It does not change your text; use Insert below to keep it where you are working.

Rewrite offers nine directions:

• Rephrase: the same thing, said another way.
• Shorter: the same events in fewer words.
• More vivid: exact words in place of vague ones, no new events, no added adjectives or similes.
• Show, don’t tell: feelings turned into what the character does, says, or notices, without stock reactions such as a clenched jaw.
• More tension: slack words cut, your sentence shapes kept, more pressure.
• More inner thought: what the character thinks and feels in the body.
• More dialogue: more of it carried in spoken lines.
• Plainer words: shorter words, same voice.
• My own direction: you type what should change.

Expand rewrites the passage longer without adding events, for a moment that went past too fast. It adds what your own pages would add there, not a detail in every sentence.

Under those sit any tools you wrote yourself. A tool that does not work on the selected text offers Insert below only.

Replace puts the answer in place of what you selected. Insert below leaves your words alone and adds the answer after them. Try again asks a second time. Nothing is written to your book until you press one of the first two.

Your own tools#

Settings > AI > Your own tools.

Give it a name and one instruction, and it appears in the AI tools menu on selected text. For example:

• As a letter: “Rewrite this as a letter from the same character to someone who was not there.”
• Cut the adverbs: “Remove every adverb. Rewrite the verbs so nothing is lost.”
• One line: “Say the whole of this in a single sentence.”

Leave Works on the text you select off for a tool that should read the book instead of a passage, such as one that suggests a title.

Your tools are stored with the book’s AI settings. They are not shared, downloaded, or sent anywhere.

The AI tab#

Open the side panel on the right and pick the AI tab. It has three parts: Chat, Ideas, and Feedback.

Chat#

A conversation about your book. It reads like a transcript: each turn shows who spoke, “You” or “AI”, above what they said. It knows the story from the same context the other tools use, and the Scene, Book, Cards, and Notes chips control what it is told. The Scene chip shows only on the Write tab, where there is a scene to send; on other pages it is left out. The sliders button beside them opens What the AI saw for your last question: each part of the context and about how many words it took. A question too long for the context window on its own is not sent; shorten it or raise the context window. Stop keeps the part of the answer that had come, marked as stopped. If an answer fails partway, the failure stays in the chat as a line of its own and the conversation carries on.

On every other page, the AI chat button in the top bar opens the same chat. Ctrl+J opens it from any page; on the writing page it opens the AI tab here.

Ideas#

Pick what you want ideas for: character names, place names, titles, “what if” questions, twists, objects, lines of dialogue, or obstacles. Add a word of steering if you like, then press Suggest ideas.

Keep the ones you like with the thumb up and turn down the ones you do not with the thumb down. Both are remembered per book and per kind, and both go back in with the next round, so the list moves toward your taste. Kept is at the bottom; the small cross forgets one. More ideas asks for another round.

Feedback#

Five notes on what you have already written, for this scene or this whole section. It quotes a few words so you can find each place. It is meant to be blunt, and it only judges what is on the page.

In the Library#

A card has Fill from the book under its summary. It reads every paragraph in the book that names that card and writes the story bible entry from them.

The answer is shown first. It only replaces your summary when you press Use.

In Plan#

Open a beat and press Break it into steps. It turns one thing that happens into the three to five smaller steps it would take on the page, and adds them to the beat’s notes.

Press Suggest beats at the top of the board for new beats in one thread and section. It reads your notes, the story so far, your Library, and the board. Uncheck the ones you do not want and press Add beats. See Plan.

Your notes#

The AI tools read a note only when The AI can read this is checked in the note’s menu. Outline notes start checked; every other note starts unchecked. See Notes.

Changing how it asks#

Settings > AI > Edit the prompts holds the instruction behind every tool on this page. Edit one to change how the model is asked; Reset to default brings the original back. The edits are per book.

What it can and cannot see#

The same rules as everywhere else in FoxQuill, listed on the AI setup page. A hidden scene, a never-mode card, a card field you have not switched on, and a note you have not let the AI read are not sent by any tool here.

Feedback and Fill from the book read more of the book than the other tools, because that is what they are for. If a section is longer than your context window, they read as much of it as fits.