Thanks for your patience during our recent outage at scalar.usc.edu. While Scalar content is loading normally now, saving is still slow, and Scalar's 'additional metadata' features have been disabled, which may interfere with features like timelines and maps that depend on metadata. This also means that saving a page or media item will remove its additional metadata. If this occurs, you can use the 'All versions' link at the bottom of the page to restore the earlier version. We are continuing to troubleshoot, and will provide further updates as needed. Note that this only affects Scalar projects at scalar.usc.edu, and not those hosted elsewhere.
Scalar 2 User's GuideMain MenuGetting StartedExplains account and book creation, and some interface basics.QuickStartsA path of all QuickStart content in this user's guide.Working with MediaHow to get the most out of your use of media in Scalar.Working with ContentCreating and editing content in Scalar.Working with WidgetsWorking with StructureHow to use Scalar's many options for structuring publications.Editorial WorkflowHow to use features for performing editorial review of content.VisualizationsExploring the contents of a book visually.LensesAn introduction to lenses, a tool for searching and visualizing Scalar content.Advanced TopicsDescribing Scalar's more advanced features.Third Party Plugins and Platforms
Switching Books Authored in Scalar 1
12015-08-07T21:13:12-07:00Curtis Fletcher3225f3b99ebb95ebd811595627293f68f680673e329621Scalar 2.0: What's Newplain2016-04-28T10:22:17-07:00Erik Loyerf862727c4b34febd6a0341bffd27f168a35aa637You are free to switch any of your books back and forth between the Scalar 1 and Scalar 2 interfaces at any time. You can do by heading to the “Book properties” tab in your Scalar Dashboard and making the appropriate selection under “Interface.”
While existing Scalar 1 books will continue to be supported indefinitely, at some point we will permanently default all newly-created books to the new interface. Authors wishing to switch a Scalar book designed in the old interface to Scalar 2 should keep the following in mind:
Scalar 2 offers many new layout options for media. All Scalar 1 media, however, will default to being right-aligned, medium sized, and will display their description as a caption. Changing these settings will require re-linking the media. (For more on the new media layout options, see the section New Focus on Media).
Any custom CSS styling done in the old interface most likely won't work anymore, and should be removed.
Visualization views for individual pages now generally focus on relationships to the current page (for instance, only pages tagged by the current page) over showing all content in the book. For whole-book visualizations, users can use the selection of visualizations available in the "Visualizations" sub-menu in the header.
Media contained in annotations and notes will not be shown in the new interface. That is, if you've made an annotation of a video or image, and included another video or image within the content of that annotation, only the text of the annotation, and not the media, will be displayed when the annotation is shown. Likewise, if you've created a note which previews a page with a video or image on it, only the text of that note will be shown when readers click on the link. Display of embedded media in annotation and notes should be added soon, however.