Overview: An outline is a good way to start thinking about the structure of your paper or project. Dragging notecards into the outline allows you to start thinking about where your facts and evidence will be used
This article applies to:
✔︎ NoodleTools School Subscription
✔︎ NoodleTools Individual License
✗ NoodleTools MLA Lite
✗ NoodleTools Express
Instructions
Step 1:
By default, the outline is hidden in both the Tabletop View and Detail View. To display the outline, check the box next to "Outline" in the upper-right corner.
Step 2:
When you first open the outline panel, a sample topic and subtopic are already in place.
Double-click on the ones titled "Topic" and "Subtopic" and rename them to what you want. You can also right-click (or on an iPad, long-press) on a topic and select "Edit" from the menu, or single-click to highlight a topic and click the "Edit" icon in the outline's toolbar.
Step 3:
To generate the outline you want, you'll need to add, delete, and move items.
Add subtopics under an existing topic:
Right-click (or long-press on an iPad) on a topic and select "Add subtopic (child)." A new subtopic is added under the selected topic, and you can then title it.
Add topics under an existing topic (at the same outline level):
Right-click (or long-press on an iPad) on a topic and select "Add subtopic (child)." A new subtopic is added under the selected topic, and you can then title it.
Move a section of the outline:
Any topic (along with its subtopics) can be dragged to another location in the outline. You can also single-click on a topic and then use the arrows in the editor to move it.
Using a combination of drag/drop and the arrow buttons is useful. For example, you can drag and drop one topic onto another topic to make the first a subtopic of the second. Then you can select the topic and move it with the up and down arrows, to order it relative to the other subtopics there if required.
Delete a topic:
Right-click (or long-press) on a topic and choose "Delete." NOTE: Deleting a topic in your outline will delete all the subtopics under that topic, so please consider this step carefully!
Step 4:
Once you have defined the structure of your outline, you can link notecards to the various outline topics you've created. "How to add notecards to the outline."
Step 5:
When you are ready to write, it is useful to have your notecards exported and open in a word processor so that you can refer to them efficiently. If you've linked them to your outline (Step 4), you can now export the notecards in the order you'll be needing them, as defined by your outline. "How to export and print the outline."