The codex while you write
The Codex button
In the editor's toolbar, beside Notes, there's Codex. Click it and a rail opens on the right with the heading In this scene: every codex entry whose name or alias appears in the scene you have open, the most-mentioned first, with a small ×count. It updates by itself a moment after each save, so when you type a new character's name into a scene, they appear in the rail without your doing anything.
Click an entry and its card unfolds: the summary, then the at-a-glance information as it stands for this book. If a character's rank is different in book 3, the rail shows the book-3 rank when you're writing book 3. Each card has Open in the codex →, which opens the full entry in a new tab.
If the rail says the book isn't in a universe, see Put your series in a universe.
Searching from the rail
The box at the top of the rail searches the whole universe, not just the scene—handy when you need to check a place the scene doesn't name yet. Clear the box and you're back to In this scene.
Adding an entry from the page
Select a name in your prose, then click + New entry at the bottom of the rail. The name is filled in; pick the type and click Add. The entry opens in the codex in a new tab, ready for its summary and details, and the rail picks it up on the next save. If nothing is selected, the search box's text is used instead.
Names underlined in the text
If you'd like the codex visible in the page itself, turn on Codex names under View in the toolbar. Every name the rail knows is in the scene gets a faint dotted underline. It's off by default, since not everyone wants marks in their prose, and the setting is remembered on this browser.
- Rest your mouse on an underlined name for half a second and a card appears: the summary, and each piece of at-a-glance information as a row you can open. Move the mouse onto the card to use its link; move away and it goes.
- Click an underlined name and the rail opens with that entry unfolded.
How names are matched
The same rules in the rail and the underlines, so they always agree:
- Whole words only. Tanis doesn't match Tanisian.
- Capitals as the codex spells the name. Will the character matches; will the verb doesn't.
- Aliases count, and the longest name wins: Tanis Richards is marked once as the full name, not also as Tanis.
- Possessives are fine: Tanis's finds Tanis.
If a name keeps matching things it shouldn't, open the entry and untick Find this name in the text automatically. It leaves the rail and the underlines everywhere in the universe; mentions search still finds it when you ask.
Opening the whole codex from here
Open the codex → at the top of the rail opens the codex in a new tab with Working in already set to this book, so the counts, the search and every entry you open show the world as this book knows it.