Compile stops. I have saved 2 compiles, but now it does not finish.
I’m on Mac M1 Ventura 13.2.1 and Scrivener 3.2.3. I’m using Non-fiction default settings to PDF.
Something seems blocked. I can choose the sections to compile, the destination on my laptop, which has plenty of space, but the Export command almost immediately has a message of “Not Responding” on the Mac. I have to “Force Quit” to stop the procedure.
I have completed successfully twice, but now it is not working.
First thing I would do is reboot my computer.
Then, if after that you still experience the issue, I would set the compiler to compile “Current selection”.
Make sure you uncheck “Include subdocuments”.
Starting at the top of your Draft/Manuscript binder folder, select and compile your documents one by one until it freezes again.
That document has an issue.
→ If you compile to a temporary folder you’d name “TrashMe”, you can save time after compiling the first document to that folder, having named it “hfewhiewhpiwsdffslh”, by just double clicking that file instead of uselessly naming each compile file.
Force quit.
Take a snapshot of that document.
Then select all of its text content.
Cut it.
Then paste it back using Paste and Match Style.
Compile.
Works?
Yes: Manually redo the formatting of the document.
No: Paste the content to a new document using Paste and Match Style
Compile that new document.
Works?
Yes: Use that new document. Move the other one outside of your draft folder, keeping it for reference. Trash it once you’re done with it.
Maybe try Zap Gremlins* on the haunted doc first (when you find it) before doing the cut & match style move? If zapping works it would save a bit of manual labor.
If your project is non-fiction, it is highly likely you have been pasting things in from the internet — which is a recipe from getting gremlins in your docs.
-gr
(* Yes, this is a real Scrivener menu item function.)
If there are many docs involved and this doesn’t turn up a culprit in the first few docs, you might want to switch to a binary search procedure rather than continuing top-down by the onesy (onesie?), as it may likely locate the first evil doc faster.
Well, sure.
As a matter of fact, one could go by slices of six, eight or ten documents.
Then do the first half of the faulty slice.
Then the second half of it if the first turned out to be fine.
Then the first half of that second slice’s slice and so on.
For what it’s worth, you could compile the top half of your project.
If it works, you know the error is in the second half.
So no need to compile it, since you know the error is in it. Rather compile the third quarter (first half of that second half), and so on and on.
Document compiles, looks fine! But now the next section “compiles & exports” but there is no text, just the section header and page number. It would be about ten pages, but there is only 1 page. Any suggestions?
Make sure you’ve assigned a Section Layout that includes the text.
If you have, then you’ve found the problem. First try compiling just that section. If that fails to work, try compiling just that section to another format, such as RTF or Word. Look for formatting weirdness, gibberish characters, that sort of thing.
If you’re still stuck, try splitting the problem section into smaller pieces, and seeing which of the pieces fails to compile.
Assigning Section Layouts did the trick to get text to appear. Now making progress. Expecting some more bumps, but hopefully I’ll be able to de bug them.
