I was going to write up a post of links to word trackers, but this site has lots of the widgets.

Do you track your wordcount? When you’re doing nano, do you use their site exclusively, or do you keep your words somewhere else? A widget tracker? A spreadsheet? What about when you’re not doing nano?

I like tracking things. I like tracking things a lot.

My current monthly wordcount chart looks like:

some other charts and tables of mine visible here.

It was modified in part from Svenja Gosen’s awesome sheets, which I seriously recommend you check out.

While that’s where I started, there are a few other sites that look good for spreadsheet templates:

This one actually looks nice, though the page itself is a bit iffy.
Nidonocu’s site is a few years out of date, but their (2009) tracker includes a calculation for words per minute, which is interesting.
The Sprint Shack (follow them on twitter if you like wordsprints!) has a very stripped down words/day whole year tracking spreadsheet
Here’s another whole-year tracker.
Justin McLachlan’s makes good use of conditional formatting, showing you % complete and +/- goal numbers.
This form is so stripped down as to barely be worth the bother, but the tips are kind of interesting.
And this Nano Report Card has some nice journalling stuff, rather similar in concept to Svenja Gosen’s but with a less pretty interface and more journalling. (“Primary Writing Location?” “Morale?”)
This one comes with a big thermometer-like bar showing progress!

There are probably more; I only went through two pages of google results. <.<

Tracking is, I think, very individual. What do you want out of your tracking (if you want it?)

Do you know of other tracking resources – or even other SORTS of tracking resources? Let me know!

Bonus link: this page has some generators and some other interesting stuff as well as spreadsheet links.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/991072.html. You can comment here or there.

So, you’re writing something! Good, good, that’s always a good first step no wait.

So, you’re planning on writing something! (or pantsing, in which case come back to this post in November, or whenever you write it 😉

You probably have characters, and they probably need names.

(I got through two very long chapters of a theoretical serial without naming the characters, once. I’m pretty sure the Finder is just named Finder by now).

Names with Meaning
Behind The Name is the most accurate, comprehensive name site I’ve found.
Think Baby Names is also pretty good.
20,000 Names has nice lists: “Dark” Names. “Weather” Names. And so on.
Want to name a character appropriately for a historical American era?
the Social Security Database goes back to 1879 with the top names for each year.
Via anke: “In case anyone wants to name someone from Germany, www.beliebte-vornamen.de has lists of the most popular baby names from 1890 to the present. just pick the birth year and see“
And here’s a huge resource on historically accurate names: The SCA’s name articles
A Name-suggester site (“I like this name.” “Try these names.”) via meridian_rose

If you can still get your hands on a phone book, that’s a great way to pick out surnames.

Or check out Wikipedia’s lists of most common surnames by location.

Names with no Meaning
Fourteen Minutes has a lovely random-name-sound generator
Springhole has several name generators
Seventh Sanctum is like the granddaddy of name generators
Chaotic Shiny has quite a few name generators, too.
This one’s new to me (Mithril & Mages) but makes some fun names.
Serendipity Generators via meridian_rose

A list of Naming resources via meridian_rose

Baby Name Wizard, via inventrix and Cal’s long and useful discussion on Behind the Name and Baby name Wizard.

There! Now that all your male characters are no longer named Jack (or maybe that’s just my problem), you’re ready to go.

Well, I mean, your characters are ready to go…

…well, at least they have names.

Know any more great sites? Let me know!

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/990164.html. You can comment here or there.