mjrusso / mountain Goto Github PK

I wanted to push Mountain to breaking point, because I'm a jerk, sorry.

I feel like the syntax for splitting a screenplay should allow the writer not to need closing tags, e.g. the following throws an error:

# ACT I

= Meet the **Hero**.

[[#reference intro.fountain]]

FADE IN:

# ACT II

# ACT III

## Finale

[[#reference the-end.fountain]]

> FADE OUT.

>THE END<

[[/reference]]

Ideally, I'd like the writer to be able to think "I'll just split this monster into smaller chunks" and go through pasting a stupidly simple tag. Even something like...

# ACT I

= Meet the **Hero**.

[[ split ]]

FADE IN:

# ACT II

# ACT III

## Finale

[[ split: the-end.fountain ]]

> FADE OUT.

>THE END<

And Mountain would chug on through, splitting into three *.fountain files, automatically numbered:

• screenplay-ref1.fountain:

# ACT I

= Meet the **Hero**.

• screenplay-ref2.fountain:

FADE IN:

# ACT II

# ACT III

## Finale

• the-end.fountain:

> FADE OUT.

>THE END<

(Where split is an alias for reference.)

I have some ideas about how to make the above syntax compatible with the rather genius way that Mountain can run join and split back and forth over the same files, but I figure my above ideas are annoying enough already!

Feel free to shoot me down here, but how about the following:

[[ include: Foo.fountain]]

As I see it, the advantages of dropping the # and appending a : are:

• "It's cleaner" -- Justin Timberlake
• It conforms more with the YAML-style metadata/title-page frontmatter
• If the include does not resolve to a file, they can be parsed as a regular note and still make sense, e.g.

[[ include: that part where she goes back for the dog.. ]]

• ...but it's more likely a writer will write, which will be ignored:

[[ include that idea with the monkey butler stealing the martini ]]

Thoughts?