Projects

A project is a folder with a target. Declare it in the front matter of any note in that folder:

---
writing-target: 80000          # words; this line makes the folder a project
writing-deadline: 2026-12-31   # optional
writing-daily: 500             # optional: words per day on this project, with its own streak (writing-goal is read as the same)
writing-name: The Bear Hunt    # optional: overrides the folder name
writing-scope: note            # optional: count only this note, not the folder
story-ignore: [LOW, POV]       # optional: names the story map must not take for characters
---

A project with no target is a folder you want to map but not pace — the novel you are reading and taking apart, or a story you are sketching before a word of it exists. Declare it with one line instead:

---
story: true                    # a project for the story map, plot grid and threads; the writing desk leaves it alone
---

The note that carries these lines is the project note. It can be the manuscript itself (a short story with one heading per scene), an outline, or an otherwise empty My Novel.md — the plugin only reads its front matter, and writes back to it when you tell the story map that a name is not a name.

What is counted

Every Markdown note whose path starts with the folder (or, with writing-scope: note, only the project note) and that is in scope. Totals come from the vault, not the writing log, so a chapter you wrote before installing the plugin counts. Memos inside the folder do not count once they carry creative-writer: false — the same line that keeps them out of the story map; see Structuring a project. Story map.md and Story threads.md never count.

The pace line

In the writing desk, each project reads as a column: total against target, a bar, a verdict with a coloured dot and one clause on the pace, then Projected and Deadline on their own lines:

Verdict	When	Says
Done	total ≥ target	Target reached.
Stalled	nothing added in the last 7 days	Nothing added this week, plus the daily rate that would still make the deadline.
Deadline passed	the deadline is behind you and the target is not met	Deadline Mon 7 Sept has passed with 2,768 words to go, then either Nothing added this week or your current rate; no daily count is promised for a date already gone. Takes the place of Stalled and Behind.
No deadline	no writing-deadline	Your last-7-day rate and the projected finish date.
On track	projected finish ≤ deadline	Words a day needed vs. writing, projected finish, deadline.
Behind	projected finish > deadline	Same numbers, with the gap spelled out.

Dates read as Mon 7 Sept, never as 2026-09-07.

"Writing N a day" is the average over the last seven days from the writing log, so a fortnight of silence shows as stalled rather than as a very late finish date.

With writing-daily, the project also gets Today N of M with its own streak, independent of the vault-wide daily goal.

Several projects

Any number of folders can be projects; a note can even declare one on a single file with writing-scope: note. The story map, the plot grid, the threads and the manuscript pick the project of the active note (the narrowest folder that contains it) and let you switch from a dropdown.