It was a huge disappointment to find that the new Windows Scrivener 3 Styles don’t actually export into MS Word as MS Word Styles.
Am I missing something here that can compile to actual Word Styles? (the actual MS Word feature called Styles, not just using different formatting on different blocks of text.)
If not, is this something that could be put on the radar?
With actual styles in the document, I won’t be forced to do such a time-consuming transition to Word part way through my editing process. As it sits now, I have to compile to Word, find each chapter heading, quote block, or other specially formatted section, and set their Styles manually before I can gain the benefit of Styles after exporting. Looking the same and being a section header does me no good if the actual Style feature of MS Word isn’t used.
It should do it already — I’ve just tested with a new project and the styles come through properly (with no changes to the def default settings needed.)
I tested it with Compile → Modern (Microsoft Word), assigned an appropriate section layout and pressed compile. That turned this:
So the process works, for the default settings, at least. If it’s not working for you, perhaps you could list the steps you went through to see what the difference is?
Notes: As this was just a test of principle, I didn’t bother playing with the section layout to give a style to the Chapter line, so that comes through as ‘Normal’, but of course you’d change that in compilation in production.
I’m using Windows V3 Scrivener (not Mac) for this test — Word is the Mac version, but that shouldn’t make a difference to the output .docx.
I’m also using the latest version of Word — Office 365 or whatever it’s called this week. If you’re using an older version of Word, then have a look at the Options panel Sharing > Conversion which says something about different converters for older versions of Word. Perhaps that may make a difference? If you are, have a look in the manual to see what’s entailed — I don’t use it so don’t really know much about it…
I compiled the tutorial. It uses the “Heading 1” tag extensively. The compiled docx file didn’t show “Heading 1” in its default list of styles, so I had to dig. Finally, I spotted the style in the master list of all styles, and then added it to the Style Gallery.
It wasn’t as seamless as I’d assumed it would be, but it looks like it works! Time for a lot more experimentation.
I think I’ve found where the problem is, and can describe it better now. I want to compile my chapter folders to generate the chapter labels in Word, and to automatically give them a “Heading 1” style in Word. In the mac version, the compile styles have a nifty little field called “Include styles information in exported file” and this check box does not exist in Windows Scriv 3.0.
So, is it possible to set it up in Windows Scrivener 3 so a compiled chapter folder automatically has a “Header 1” style in the resulting Word file?
I don’t want to have to add a style to every chapter title after I export to windows, and I don’t want to create an extra block of text where I type in each chapter name within the chapter just so I can style it.
Hmm, that setting should be showing up for you, and in precisely the same place as in the Mac version: within the gear button in the top-right corner of the Styles compile format pane. That said, as with the Mac built-in formats and default settings, it should already be on by default anyway.
The only thing that isn’t “on” by default is the assignment of any styles to text in the Formatting pane of section layouts. The ingredients you need to make this work are the same on both platforms:
The style needs to be in the Styles compile format pane. If you have a “Heading 1” in the project’s stylesheet, but it’s never used by any text in the output, then it will be ignored since it is never used. Most of our built-in Formats do have a full compliment of common styles, so you may not have to take this step unless you’re building something from scratch.
With the desired style added to the list, in the Section Layouts pane, go to the layout that drives your folder heading text, click into the sample text in the Formatting pane, and use the style dropdown in the format bar to assign it.
Where is this found? I can find the Styles panel, and some style areas in the Compile dialog, and Style options on various menus, but nothing that looks like what you’re describing or what is pictured in the pdf manual. There are two gear icons on the compile dialog, but none lead to anything like that.
Click to Compile, open a format (maybe creating a copy of a built-in so you can edit it), and click on the Styles pane. There you can add styles that already exist in Editor if you want to modify them or add new styles. New styles or modifications to existing take effect in the compile format you’re editing.
In the editor you could use a “body text” style that isn’t justified, but in Compile you could modify it to justify text in exported products (for example).
Thank you for that helpful pointer, DRMAJORBOB. And thanks BROOKTER for the post with the screenshots above that shows input/output from/to Scriv/Word.
I’ve been encouraged and even relived to find that importing and exporting styles between S3 and Word seems to retain the main functionality of styles in Word, including Document Map navigation, which is (or can be) based on the native Heading styles. …
Word recognizes the styles that come out of S3 via both Export and Compile, and works with those styles the same as its native styles.
And Word styles (at least the first “Heading” levels and “Normal” styles) retain their names and formatting when imported into S3 (at least if styles with those names already exist in the S project,)
Smooth and easy interchangeability is a deal maker/breaker for my using S3, and is why I steered away from deeper involvement with S1, even though I love the basic Scrivener binder/document model.
I’m just doing tests so far. Importing, exporting, compiling, opening the exports in Word, editing in Word, and seeing how faithfully it can be brought back into S3…
I’m finding some inconsistencies, or that there are settings or conditions, some variables I’ve not yet determined, where things seem to not work the same way every time. Not sure. That’s potentially discouraging.
But overall it seems to handle styles as I need and as I’d been hoping it would. Maybe even better than expected, tbh.
Thank you, I was lost in styles in the editor versus styles in the compiler. Your instructions were very helpful to get them to show up in Word in the navigation pane.
Stacey
I’ve followed all the advice on this thread and absolutely nothing will let me compile with folder/section headings converting to H1/H2 styles in Word.
I’ve used the “Default” format as-is, as well as the “Modern” and the “Manuscript (Times)” defaults. I’ve created a new format to edit it, and made sure that “Include styles information in exported file” is checked.
I’ve exported in .docx and .odt, but same issue. When I use the “Default” format, the text for chapter headings is in formatted to LOOK like H1/H2 but are in the default text style.
I’m completely flummoxed. What on earth could possibly be the issue?
The key missing ingredient is what I outlined here:
If you go back into your Section Layouts pane, while editing a format, click into the heading in the Formatting tab, and then examine the style dropdown in the format bar, does it say “No Style”? You won’t get any styles if it says that!
Now if the dropdown has nothing to pick from, then you need to go back to the first step in that same post and add these styles to your Format, in the Styles pane.
As noted before, none of the default compile Formats apply styles to the text. So you will not get any styled text unless you use them in the text editor, or go in and edit a copy of the Format as described. They are off by default because there is no good way for a generic format that does everything from parts to chapters to sections to know which of these should be H1, H2 and so on, since you might use one or all three or even more.
The checkbox to include style information only includes what information you tell the software to use, either by using styles in the editor or by setting up your Section Layouts correctly. It is not going to guess at what you need and apply stuff you haven’t stipulated just because it is on. It is better to think of that setting as a way of stripping styles when you have used them, but for whatever reason (usually compatibility) you do not want them. In fact that checkbox would probably better be labelled “Remove style information from exported file”, and be off by default, to clear up that potential point of confusion.
I think I found the solution. Maybe others have expressed it, too, already but for me it was this way of verbalizing it that explains it. If headings in your compiles MS Word are not automatically recognized as such, then follow these steps:
1 Compile → Edit format
2. Under Section Layouts you’ll see the various layouts in the first column Layout Name.
3. Click on the first layout in the list. Now: Look at the box below where you can tweak the formatting. Most likely you have “No Style” selected in the first drop-down menu of where you choose your style. This, however, is what is communicated to MS Word: the Heading 1, Heading 2 and so on.
4. To fix this, you need to choose one of the headings rather than “No Style” and if you don’t like the default formatting of, for example, Heading 1 → go to Styles on the very left side of the window. Change the way that you want Heading 1, Heading 2 to be formatted.
5. Voilà, MS Word will now recognize the headings.
