AI structural editing: why it edits by field

In one line: which five structured files the AI can now edit, what it can touch in each, and why it works field by field instead of rewriting the whole file.

The problem this solves

Ink Tide keeps a file called Story Skeleton.beats in its Notes folder: three acts, fourteen beats. Say you want the AI to add a beat in the middle of Act Two, where Shen Yan works out that Pei Zhao has been copying the same Tide Records.

The AI can read that board — but what it reads is not the raw file. It reads a summary: acts, each beat's label and note, which file each card points at. Coordinates, sort keys and colours are left out, because putting them in would crowd out the part that actually matters.

A summary is lossy. So if the AI were allowed to answer with "here is the new content of this file", everything it was never shown would quietly disappear. Drop a sort key and the cards land in the wrong order. Drop a file card it never saw printed and the chapter you pinned there is gone from the board — with no error anywhere.

4.0 replaces that route. The AI no longer hands back a file. It sends named operations, one per change: "in Act Two, after beat seven, add a beat with this label." Anything it did not mention is left byte for byte alone.

Five files, and what the AI can touch in each

File	The AI can	Deliberately closed
.script screenplay	Add a scene, change a scene heading, remove a scene; add / change / remove the elements inside a scene (dialogue, action, transitions, shots…)	The local-vs-Hollywood format settings
.beats beat board	Add / change / remove acts; add / change / remove / move beats	The chapter and screenplay cards you pinned. Removing an act leaves its beats ungrouped rather than deleting them; removing a beat leaves its cards where they are
.map relationship map	Add / change / move / remove nodes; add / change / remove edges; add / change / remove groups; change the map's title	A group's box — that is computed from its members. And the tool that edits a node's data will not quietly move it; moving is a separate tool
.geomap world map	Add / change places, add / change text labels, draw rivers, draw borders, paint terrain and vegetation, remove a place or label, change the map's title	The canvas size and the coordinate system. It works in grid cells, not pixels
.timeline timeline	Add / change / remove entries; set up a calendar	A source you pinned by hand (a note or a chapter). And the calendar tool never touches entries

If you have read an older note saying the timeline is read-only to the AI, that note is out of date — the timeline is writable now.

There is also a set of note tools, which unlock once your book has at least one note, or once the AI has made the first one for you. Creating a note is available from the start.

Whole-file writing is blocked

On these five types the generic write tools are refused, not discouraged. Overwrite the file, replace part of it, delete it — in the Writing Studio all three are turned away for these five extensions. The field-level tools are the only path. So "the AI overwrote my relationship map" is not a thing that can happen: that move does not exist.

The one exception is create. The AI can open an empty .beats, .timeline, .map, .geomap or .script for you — the same empty file you would get from right-clicking a folder and choosing New beat board — and then fill it in with the field-level tools. So "make me a relationship map for Ink Tide and put the eight characters on it" is a request that works.

Several changes at once: batches

"Add an act, then put three beats in it" is four round trips if each one is its own call, and every round trip is a wait. So each type also has a batch tool that lets the AI pack several operations into one call.

Two things about that are worth knowing, because they change what you see:

The two rules inside a batch

Op 1 creates "Act IV" Op 2 points at the act just created and adds a beat Op 3 adds another

A later operation can refer to something an earlier one created, so "open an act and fill it" is one call.

• All or nothing. If any operation in the batch fails, none of it is applied — you never end up with the act created and only two of the three beats in it. On failure the AI is told the whole batch landed nowhere, and retries with the error in hand.
• You accept per call, not per mark. A batch shows up as several marks on screen, but those marks all belong to one call; pressing Accept on any of them takes the whole batch. The number on the floating pill counts calls too, so a batch counts as one.
• A batch always carries one line describing what it is for. That line is written for you, and it is what you read on the review card.

If you would rather approve them separately, tell the AI to make one change at a time and it will send them as individual calls.

What happens after it edits

One operation or fifty, nothing is written to the file. It becomes a pending proposal first: additions grow where they belong, and anything being changed or removed is marked on the card, line or node it already lives on, with Accept and Skip right there.

The whole of that is in Reviewing the AI's structural changes in place.

Two things to be clear about

• The AI never starts on its own. Nothing tidies your beat board or fills in your timeline in the background. It edits when you ask it to in the AI Coach panel, and even then it waits for your Accept.
• Sometimes it will tell you it can't. That is usually not a fault — this chat has not been given that file type's tools yet. Why, and what to do, is in When the AI can edit structure, and when it can't.

Related

• Docs: Reviewing the AI's structural changes in place
• Docs: When the AI can edit structure, and when it can't
• Docs: Change Review: review AI edits (prose)
• Docs: What a beat board is, and when to use one
• Docs: What the timeline (.timeline) is for
• Docs: Relationship Map: draw your characters' connections
• Docs: What a world map file is (.geomap)
• Docs: AI tools and the diff workflow