Summary

In this chapter, we looked at the seemingly simple concept of alternatives. In ink, the three types of alternatives are sequences, cycles, and shuffles. Each provides a different way of accessing its elements. Sequences show each element in turn until its last one. Cycles repeat their elements, looping back to the first element after encountering the end. Shuffles select a random element from their set each time they are run, creating a way to introduce randomness to stories for the first time.

Alternatives can also be expressed in both one-line and multi-line forms. When written in their longer multi-line forms, alternatives use a keyword for their type and have each element on a separate line. While much easier to read for an author, we reviewed how care must be taken to incorporate glue because of how ink interprets each line of text in a story.

Finally, we learned alternatives can be combined in a nested form. An element of an alternative can be another alternative...