I’ve noted other similar requests. I suggest that during compile there be an indication of which item is being compiled in order to help track down when compiling doesn’t work.
I have a 1000 page project that won’t compile. Knowing where it fails would be helpful.
That would be a great idea in my opinion.
Although I am not sure it could be done so that it’d be usable in real time.
From my understanding, the compile process is not necessarily a linear operation. I think there is (some? or a lot?) a certain amount of back and forth between documents that takes place. (For sure if using placeholders, I would say.)
If integrated to the progress window, likely the status would change so fast that it would be unreadable…
But, but but, it’d be very convenient if the compile process could write a simple log of what it does as the compile process is taking place. – One line per undertaken group of operations (just the name of the binder document it is intended to be done to would suffice). So that in the cases where the compile fails, you’d be able to tell where the error is, the faulty document being the last listed in the log.
As for the log (a simple .txt file?), let it be overwritten with each new compile.
This would be a huge time saver when things go wrong.
+1
Actually, I discovered recently that when you set the Internal log console to show, you can see what Scrivener is doing while compiling.
File > Options > General > Warnings, Show internal log console.
Don’t know how to get that data into the GUI, though.
Hmm… That would probably do just what’s needed, but unfortunately it is not listing anything during compile at my end. (Windows user.)
?
Restart Scrivener? Works on my machine. 
This seems like what I’m after. (Goes hunting for that feature🤓)
Wow, keep finding out new things. Hope you found english speaking person to edit that theme book, looking forward to seeing that.
UPDATE
I still can’t get it to show the compile process.
But here’s what : I think it is not doing it for you either.
Previously I was compiling a document using “Current Selection” as the compile scope. And I would get nothing.
Now, I just tried compiling a full project and got something from the log.
But it is not the actual compile process. Rather Scrivener loading the files for the first time.
Try this: have Scrivener and the log/warnings side by side.
Now compile your project ? You’ll get new lines in the log.
Compile a second time right away : nothing. (Scrivener has already opened/loaded those document’s RTF source files.)
So what we see is not the compile process, but rather Scrivener loading parts of the project that were not called upon (viewed in the editor) before launching the compile operation.
(Or so I would think.)
While it is of no help when trying to diagnose a problem at compile, on the other hand it may prove useful in diagnosing a faulty document that is preventing a project from loading… (Perhaps perhaps)
I know this isn’t a tech support question, but the first thing to check when the Compile command is hanging is whether it’s a problem with a specific file or with the Compile process overall. You can do that with partial compiles: just the first chapter, just the problem chapter, etc.
It’s also useful to check other formats. PDF, Word, and ebooks exercise the command in different ways, so it’s not unusual to have a problem with one format but not the others.
Appreciated. I’m at my iPad, but will check out the log and partial compiles. 