Quick question

What happens if I finish the 50k words by November 30th but am not done with my novel? What happens when I validate my novel?

The goal is to reach 50k. For most people, their novel will not be complete. 50k is actually not that long for a novel, so you'll likely still have some work to do when November is over. In order to validate, you upload your document and it does a simple word count, that's all. Just make sure you have your novel saved somewhere other than the NaNo site and you'll be fine to continue writing into December.

Just want to add that when you validate it, it doesn't get stored. No one on the website will read it. The words are counted and that's that.

Also, I highly suggest validating a few days early even if you aren't to 50k yet. Some word processors report word counts vastly different than the official NaNoWriMo word counter. Microsoft Word is only off at most by ten words, but Open Office has been known to be off by a few hundred. BTW, there's no limit to how many times you validate your novel. Validation starts around the 25th.

When the time comes to validate - usually November 25, go ahead and validate if your over 50k. Then keep writing. You only have to validate once, but you can keep updating your word count until 11:59 PM, November 30.

Okay, thanks! That little tip about OpenOffice was scary, good thing I saw that ahead of time! My dad runs Linux so I use OpenOffice to write.........I think it's LibreOffice Writer now.....is that even the same thing?
-I am a writer. Not a computer programmer.-
I'll validate the 25th to check the difference in word counts so I can adjust my goals.
Thanks again! :D

I don't know. If you're really worried about not knowing your 'real' word count, you can get nanowrimo to count it for you. Go to the 'Edit Novel Info' page and under word count is a link that says 'I am ready to validate my novel'. Click it and copy/paste your novel into it. You can do that as much as you want, but you can't qualify as a winner until the 25th.

It's not telling me what my word count on NaNo is........is that bad? I'm trying to finish today, so I guess I'll find out if it's not working before the 30th. If I hit 51k on my word count and it won't validate, should I do something other than worry? If so, what?
Congrats on the win by the way!

Phoenixica24 wrote:
It's not telling me what my word count on NaNo is........is that bad? I'm trying to finish today, so I guess I'll find out if it's not working before the 30th. If I hit 51k on my word count and it won't validate, should I do something other than worry? If so, what?
Congrats on the win by the way!

I'm not sure what you mean. Are you copy and pasting your novel text into the validation box?

Yes.......then I click 'submit' and it goes away. It looks like it reloads the page and/but nothing changes.

Phoenixica24 wrote:
Yes.......then I click 'submit' and it goes away. It looks like it reloads the page and/but nothing changes.

But you got the purple bar, so you don't need to validate anymore. Just update your word count at the top of the page. (Only have to validate one time at or above 50K.)

I tried it as soon as I hit 50k on my word count-I'm actually shocked it worked but totally not complaining! :D

Good. It worked. (And you made it! Woot!)

Yay!
Only problem now is printing the certificate and getting the prizes-my parents won't talk to me tonight, so I'm wondering if that will be available tomorrow as well?

It should be available for several weeks. The important thing is to validate before midnight on the 30th.

Done! Thanks!
-Bedtime. I have pep band till late tomorrow night after having to get up early for school.-
I'm hoping to talk my parents into letting me go on the 8th as well, so might see you there! :D