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Editorial Board

The Editorial Board is Scritorio’s book-level AI critique system. Each book has its own board, seeded from built-in defaults and then customizable for that specific manuscript. The board is intentionally not an app-level preference. A hard science fiction novel, a historical novel, and an adult nonfiction book may need different editorial emphasis, different audience assumptions, and different prompt tuning. Those choices belong with the book.

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Board Location

In the desktop app, Editorial Board appears as a book navigation item after the existing book sections and after Exports. It opens a board overview in the main panel. The navigation item can expand into the individual board members: Selecting a board member opens that member’s dossier-style sheet. The sheet uses compact character-dossier-style panels for editable prompt categories, plus a generated prompt panel.

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Book Metadata Flow

The book summary is the source of truth for:
  • genre
  • audience age group
  • audience sex/gender lens
Audience age group values are:
  • Child
  • Teen
  • Young Adult
  • Adult
Audience sex/gender lens values are:
  • Any
  • Female
  • Male
Genre and audience age are treated as important prompt metadata. If either is missing, the Editorial Board warns the author and generated prompts expose placeholders such as [genre not set] or [audience age not set]. The Any sex/gender lens is valid and is not treated as missing.

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Prompt Formation

Every board member prompt is generated from three layers:
  1. Locked system rules: the built-in role and shared behavioral rules. These are visible in the board sheet for now, but not editable.
  2. Book-level board member configuration: editable fields saved for the selected book and board member.
  3. Book metadata variables: genre, audience age group, and audience sex/gender lens from the current book.
The generated system prompt panel shows the prompt that would be supplied for the selected board member and current unsaved draft. Edits to configurable sections update the preview before saving. All board member prompts include this audience context: 
# Book Audience Context

- Book genre: hard science fiction
- Target audience age group: young adult
- Target audience sex/gender lens: female
Five board members use the same role pattern: 
You are the Developmental Editor persona that specializes in hard science fiction books for a young adult target audience with a female sex/gender lens.
The First-Time Reader is different. It acts as a reader from the selected book audience: 
You are the First-Time Reader persona. Take on the perspective of a female reader who is 15 years old, fits the young adult target audience, and actively enjoys hard science fiction books.
The generated reader age is derived from the audience age group:
Audience age groupReader age used in prompt
Child9
Teen13
Young Adult15
Adult35

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Editable Configuration

Each board member keeps the same structured customization fields:
  • priorities for this book
  • avoid or de-emphasize
  • preferred feedback style
  • output format notes
  • additional instructions
  • editable prompt sections, except locked role/system sections
The First-Time Reader also keeps reader-specific freeform fields:
  • reading habits
  • domain literacy
  • patience level
  • emotional sensitivity
  • knowledge mode
The First-Time Reader no longer owns editable age or sex/gender controls. Those values are read-only on the board sheet because they come from the book metadata.

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Storage

Book-level customizations are stored as Markdown: 
<book>/editorial-board/<board-member-id>.md
Examples: 
editorial-board/developmental-editor.md
editorial-board/first-time-reader.md
Built-in defaults remain in code. A book only gets a file when that board member has been customized. For compatibility, Scritorio loads from editorial-board/<board-member-id>.md first, then falls back to the legacy personas/<board-member-id>.md path when present. Saving always writes to editorial-board/. Reset removes the editorial-board/ customization file and returns the member to built-in defaults.

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Chat Sessions

Board member configuration is part of the chat session key. When a board member’s configuration changes, Scritorio creates a distinct chat session instead of silently reusing a stale one. Book prompt variables are also part of that distinction. Changing genre, audience age group, or audience sex/gender lens can therefore produce a new session for the same board member. Advisor chat uses the OpenAI Responses API conversation chain when available. After the first response, the next request can continue from previous_response_id rather than resending the full assistant transcript. The prompt preview should therefore show the response id and a compact local transcript reference, while clearly separating that review chrome from the actual next request messages. The advisor waiting bubble can show live tool-call detail and managed-model routing status. Appearance settings let the author hide tool rows, hide Flex/Fast routing detail, or hide the Peek Prompt composer button without changing the underlying request. When a board member quotes exact manuscript text, the prompt requires a [[locate:...]] marker immediately after the quote. Scritorio turns model-supplied markers into a green selection affordance that can highlight the source text. Neutral inferred affordances may appear when the app recognizes a quote without a marker, but the marker is the reliable path.

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First-Time Reader Images

The First-Time Reader image is selected from book audience metadata. Scritorio looks for images in this order:
  1. exact sex/gender plus age group
  2. sex/gender fallback
  3. the original first-time-reader.png
  4. icon fallback
The filename convention is: 
first-time-reader-{sex}-{age}.png
Current exact variants include:
Audience lensAge groupImage
FemaleChildfirst-time-reader-female-child.png
FemaleTeenfirst-time-reader-female-teen.png
FemaleYoung Adultfirst-time-reader-female-young-adult.png
FemaleAdultfirst-time-reader-female-adult.png
MaleChildfirst-time-reader-male-child.png
MaleTeenfirst-time-reader-male-teen.png
MaleYoung Adultfirst-time-reader-male-young-adult.png
MaleAdultfirst-time-reader-male-adult.png
The app includes a small asset version marker when loading persona images so newly replaced canonical files appear without stale webview caching.

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Relationship To Settings

Settings no longer contains a Personas section. Settings remains for app-level concerns such as AI configuration, token usage, and Wastebasket. Editorial behavior belongs to the selected book.

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Character Chat

Character chat is a companion mode to the Editorial Board, not a board member. It lets the author talk with a simulated character for inspiration and grounding. The mode should use the character’s soul.md, approved dossier facts, and selected manuscript context to answer in character while clearly labeling any out-of-character author notes or canon proposals. Character chat should help authors explore voice, motivation, secrets, relationship pressure, and dialogue possibilities. It must not silently turn improvised answers into canon or manuscript text.