Certificate of Authorship
Publishers and agents have started asking a question that used to go without saying: did a person write this book?
A Certificate of Authorship helps you answer. It’s a two-page PDF that shows how your book came together in Dabble: where the words came from, when you wrote them, and how you wrote them. Anyone you share it with can check it’s genuine, no Dabble account needed.
It’s a record of your writing, built from the changes Dabble already saves. It isn’t an AI detector, and it never gives your book an AI score.
Who it’s for
Section titled “Who it’s for”Anyone who wants a record of how they wrote their book. Keep one ready for the agent or publisher who asks, add it to a contest entry that wants one, or share the link with a curious reader.
You can make a new certificate whenever you like, so it’s easy to send an up-to-date one with each submission.
Get a certificate
Section titled “Get a certificate”- Open Manuscripts in the left sidebar to see your books as cards.
- Under the book’s card, click Get Certificate. Or open the book’s ⋯ menu and choose Certificate of Authorship….
- Dabble works out the figures for your book. A long book can take a moment.
- Use the Certificate and Details tabs to preview the two pages.
- Pick a Style: Engraved, Archival, or Modern. The figures are the same in each; only the look changes.
- Under Include, turn on the parts you want to show:
- Editor and Co-Author Names shows the names of the people who worked on the book with you.
- Monthly Writing Chart adds a bar chart of the words you typed each month.
- Writing Pace adds how many sessions you wrote in, your active writing hours, and how many words a minute you typed.
- Usual Writing Hours shows the times of day you tend to write.
- Click Download PDF. Your browser’s print dialog opens. Choose Save as PDF as the destination, then save the file.
The PDF is US Letter size, or A4 if Dabble’s language is set to UK English.
Once you’ve made a certificate, the link under the book’s card reads Certified and the date instead. Keep writing and the card tells you the certificate is out of date, with how many words you’ve written since. Open it and download again to issue an up-to-date one.
A book with no words yet shows “Certificate available once you start writing” under its card, with no link.
Two more buttons sit beside Download PDF:
- Copy Verification Link copies the link where anyone can check your certificate. Paste it into a query letter or email.
- Download Data (CSV) saves the certificate’s figures as a spreadsheet file.
What the certificate shows
Section titled “What the certificate shows”The first page is the certificate itself. The second page, the details, breaks the figures down in three parts.
Where the words came from
Section titled “Where the words came from”Every word in your book today is credited to the change that put it there. The certificate lists each source, with its word count and share of the book:
- Typed by you. Words you typed into Dabble, including dictation, and your own edits such as find and replace, grammar fixes, and thesaurus swaps. The certificate shows your name here.
- Typed by a co-author. Words a co-author typed into the book.
- Accepted suggestions from an editor. Words an editor suggested with track changes that were then accepted. They stay credited to the editor who suggested them.
- Pasted from outside Dabble. Text pasted in from another app or website. Dabble can’t see where it came from, so the certificate says the source is unknown.
- Imported from a file. Text that came in from an imported file, such as a Word document. The file name is shown when Dabble knows it.
- Written before this record began. Text that was already in the book before Dabble had a history of it.
- Added in large blocks. On older books, text that arrived in big chunks, about 60 words or more in one go, with no record of whether it was typed or pasted. This figure is estimated.
- Added by Dabble. Changes Dabble made itself: text from a template, and the rare repair to a damaged document.
Words you move don’t change hands. Cut a paragraph from chapter three and paste it into chapter nine, copy a passage from elsewhere in your project, or restore an older version, and those words stay credited to whoever first wrote them. The certificate tells you how many words were moved this way.
When it was written
Section titled “When it was written”- The dates of your first and last words.
- How many days you wrote on.
- Your longest run of writing days in a row.
- With Monthly Writing Chart on, a chart of the words you typed each month, along with how many of them you later cut.
How it was written
Section titled “How it was written”- Words typed for every word kept. Writing a novel means drafting, cutting, and drafting again. A figure of 3.3 means you typed 3.3 words for every word in the finished book.
- Text that arrived a few words at a time. The share of your book that came in small changes, the way typing does.
- Paragraphs revised after first writing. The share of paragraphs you came back to and changed in a later session.
- Recorded changes. How many saved changes the certificate was built from.
- Sessions and active writing hours. How many times you sat down to write, and how long you spent actively writing.
- Words a minute. Your typing pace while writing. Pastes are left out so they can’t inflate it.
Sessions, active writing hours, and words a minute only appear when Writing Pace is on and your book has at least 30 minutes of typing. With less than that, there isn’t enough typing to measure a fair pace.
How it’s made
Section titled “How it’s made”Dabble saves every change to your book with who made it and when. That’s how your writing syncs between devices and how version history works.
The certificate replays that record from the first change to the latest, crediting each word to the change that put it there. It’s arithmetic on your history, nothing more.
No AI is used to generate the certificate, and Dabble does not scan your writing for signs of AI. There’s no score, and no guess about whether your prose “sounds” human. To read more about why Dabble keeps AI out, see Dabble is AI-free.
What it can’t show
Section titled “What it can’t show”A certificate is honest about its limits, and so is this page. It can’t show:
- Where pasted text came from. Pasted words are counted and labelled, but their source is unknown.
- Text retyped from somewhere else. If someone copies text by typing it out, it looks like typing.
- Anything away from the page. Notes on paper, research, conversations, or drafts in another app before they reached Dabble.
What a certificate does show is that your book was built up in Dabble over time, and by whom. Treat it as supporting evidence of your authorship, not proof of it. The certificate says so too.
Words written before 30 October 2026
Section titled “Words written before 30 October 2026”On 30 October 2026, Dabble began recording how each change arrives: typed, pasted, imported, or restored. Every word you’ve written in Dabble since then counts in full on your certificate.
You can still make a certificate for a book you started before then. For the earlier writing, Dabble estimates where the words came from. The certificate tells the reader where the estimate stops: it says “Detailed tracking began on” followed by the date, and labels the estimated figures. If the whole book was written before then, it says detailed tracking hadn’t yet begun for this book.
The more you write from here on, the more of your certificate is recorded rather than estimated.
The estimate goes by the size of each change, nothing else. A single addition of about 60 words or more in one go counts as Added in large blocks, because it could have been typed or pasted. Anything smaller counts as typed by whoever made the change.
Text that has no history at all, such as words already in a book when it was moved into Dabble, shows as Written before this record began.
A book whose words all arrived that way, copied or imported in and never written in, has no writing to certify. Dabble shows No Writing Recorded for This Book Yet instead of a certificate. Write in the book, then come back for one.
See the record in your book
Section titled “See the record in your book”Attribution Highlighting tints the text of your book by the certificate line each passage counts toward, so you can see exactly which words are typed, pasted, imported, or someone else’s.
- Open a scene in the book.
- Click View Options (the eye icon in the header) and turn on Attribution Highlighting. Or press Cmd+Opt+P on a Mac, Ctrl+Alt+P on Windows or Linux.
A key opens in the corner of the editor, with one row for each line of the certificate, in its colour, and how many words it covers. On each row:
- The eye button shows or hides that colour, so you can look at one source at a time.
- The arrow button jumps to the next passage from that line. It’s a quick way to find a paste you meant to rewrite.
Words underlined in the tint rewrote someone else’s text rather than adding new text.
The tint is only on your screen. It isn’t saved into your book, and your collaborators don’t see it. Turn it off from View Options, with the shortcut again, or with the close button on the key.
Check a certificate
Section titled “Check a certificate”When you click Download PDF or Copy Verification Link, Dabble issues a certificate with its own number, like DCA-7K4Q-92XM. The number and a link to check it are printed on the certificate.
If neither the book nor your Style and Include choices have changed since your last certificate, you get that same certificate again, with the same number. Change the book or one of those choices, and the next click issues a new certificate with a new number.
Anyone can check a certificate at dabblewriter.com/verify/ followed by the number, for example dabblewriter.com/verify/7K4Q92XM. No account is needed. The page shows:
- Whether the certificate is genuine, and when Dabble issued it.
- The book’s title, the author, and the figures on the certificate.
- Whether the book is still in Dabble.
- Whether you’ve made a newer certificate for the same book.
If someone changes a PDF, its figures won’t match the verification page, so the change is easy to spot. The page also links to an exact copy of the certificate as Dabble issued it, to compare side by side.
Share a Live Record
Section titled “Share a Live Record”A certificate is a snapshot of the day you made it. A Live Record is a page that keeps up as you keep writing.
The Live Record is off by default. To share it, turn on Anyone With the Link under Live Record, then click Copy and paste the link wherever you need it. Anyone with the link sees your book’s figures as they are today, using the Include choices you have set. The first time, the page can take a minute to show its figures.
When someone opens the page and the figures are more than a day old, Dabble refreshes them in the background. That visitor sees the figures from the last refresh, and later visits get the new ones.
While your Live Record is on, the verification page for your certificates links to it too.
You can stop sharing any time by turning off Anyone With the Link. The link stops working straight away. Turn it back on later and the same link works again.
What stays private
Section titled “What stays private”No text from your manuscript appears on a certificate, the verification page, or a Live Record. They show figures, your book’s title, your name, and the names of any collaborators you choose to include. The CSV download holds the same figures and nothing more.
Who can make one
Section titled “Who can make one”Certificates of Authorship are included with every paid Dabble plan, with no separate subscription. See What features do I get in Dabble? for the plans.
The book’s owner and co-authors can make a certificate and use Attribution Highlighting. People with the Editor, Reviewer, or Reader role don’t see either option.