Can I turn the text formatting off? If I type 2nd, I don’t want a tiny nd. If I hit return, I don’t want the equivalent to two returns and a tab. I just want a return.
I’d really like to use Scrivener for writing everything from a novel to blog posts, but the formatting gets in my way. Can I set Scrivener to plain text somehow?
You cannot opt to use plain-text files with Scrivener as a good number of its editing and writing features depend upon the rich text engine for their operation. However you can certainly mimic the look of a plain-text editor in Scrivener (that is how I work as well).
Use the Formatting preferences pane to set up how new documents should be formatted. Here you can choose a fixed width font if you prefer, remove paragraph spacing and indents and anything else that is getting in your way. To clean up existing documents, select them in the Binder and use the Documents/Convert/Formatting to Default Text Style menu command.
Okay, as for the little text-to-glyph things like nd, you can switch all of those off in the Corrections preference pane (though some of those are instigated by the operating system, we’ve provide a convenient button for getting to the appropriate OS X panel to change them).
I’m not trying to use plain text files. I just want no text formatting at all on the text I type in Scrivener, just as there is no text formatting when I type in this box right now. I want no auto indents, no auto extra space between paragraphs, no curly quotes… none of that stuff. I’m struggling to find where in Scriveners prefs I shut all of that stuff off. And then, once I figure out how to shut it all off, how do I convert my Scrivener project entirely to that setup?
Ah, the corrections preferences pane. Got it! I unchecked everything there! Much better.
My goal is to be able to copy and paste into other apps when I have a blog post or another piece of writing - or even a section of writing - to share elsewhere, without having the hassles of converting or exporting. That’s why I abandoned Microsoft Word a decade ago.
LOVE Scrivener, by the way.
Did you find the Formatting preference pane? There is a little mock editor with some text. You can use the formatting controls there to make it look exactly like you want.
Here, this thread may help you out some. Do note that loading a preference file will replace all preferences of course. This uses default settings for most everything, but with revised settings to make the editor feel more like a plain-text editor.
If you have too many settings, what you can do is just save a preset of your current settings in that same “Manage” button. Then you can browse these settings at your leisure, and once you figure out what needs to be changed, switch back to your preferred settings and implement the changes.
Thanks for the tip! Will do!