When Automated Insights introduced Shared Templates, a new way to organize and manage large or complex Templates in Wordsmith, we were immediately flooded with positive feedback. Users loved how flexible and easy Shared Templates made their workflow. We began taking note of some of the more popular ways that people were using the new feature and decided to share them. The following are the “Top 5” most common use cases for Shared Templates:
1. Divide and Conquer
Use Shared Templates to collaborate with team members within a narrative Template. You can quickly divide a Template among peers and then combine all parts into one master Template. This approach allows multiple team members to work independently on their individual Templates, while the master Template reflects all of their edits in real-time.
2. Break it Down
If you’re writing a long article in Wordsmith, Shared Templates lets you break it up into smaller, more manageable chunks. To do this, divide the large Template into individual, unique sections (or Templates). You’ll now be able to work on each smaller section independently from the larger Template.
3. Recycle Your Work
To save some time, try converting any Branches that you find yourself using in multiple places throughout your project into a Shared Template. Then, if you ever want to change that Branch or Synonym, you’ll only have to do it once. Wherever that Template is used will automatically reflect those updates.
4. Repeat a complex Branch
Shared Templates are especially powerful if you use nested Branches that may require a lot of conditional logic to create a certain phrase or combination of data variables. Use Shared Templates to duplicate the complex Branch for use elsewhere in your Template. You’ll find that this approach is a huge time-saver since you won’t have to make the same edits to the Branch multiple times.
This Branch that lists the features available in a TV could easily be used multiple times in our Template if we turn it into its own Template.
5. Re-order sentences or paragraphs
A popular way to add variability to your narratives is to reorder the sentences in a paragraph, or reorder the entire set of paragraphs in a Template. Shared Templates helps you navigate through paragraphs in a Template by making each one its own Template. That way, any changes you make to that paragraph will just have to be made once.
We hope that you found these use cases to be helpful. If you’re using Shared Templates in a way not mentioned here, please feel free to share it with us. Thanks! Want to start using natural language generation, but not sure how? Head over to the Wordsmith Gallery for some inspiration!