"Main text formatting will be based on how text appears in the editor."

In Compile.
This is a problem.
The text in the editor, in my experience, is rarely uniform.
Even when I set a default font and size, even when I transfer text using “Paste and Match Style” line spacing is sometimes wrong and unwanted artifacts unexpectedly get brought over. &nbsp
You never had to worry about this before, since Compile fixed all these problems.
Compile was the soul of Scrivener.
But now?
How to establish uniformity amongst text in different files?
Does Compile give an answer? Open the Compile panel and there are no defaults. That is, the default is blank:
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What if there are no section types? Now what? When drafting a document you don’t always know what the ultimate structure may be. The structure of a novel is usually–though not always–relatively simple, but there are dozens of other examples of books with intercalated chapters, sidebars, and what have you.
In an appellate brief, is a statement of font and font size front matter? Probably. But are you sure? You can start writing, or futz around with it. Or look it up. Or post on the forums. I’d rather start writing. What about Summary of Argument?
A table of authorities? A Mini-ToC listing cases cited in this section? In a novel, a dream sequence which is part of, but typeset completely differently from, a chapter in a novel? This gave InDesign fits. When composing the document–and remember, Scrivener is the first draft tool par excellence–you will often not have the answer to these questions, if you even have considered them.
If you want to structure as you go along, write in LaTeX/Lyx: you are forced to put on the dress of the text’s structure, whether it is too tight or not. Otherwise you can’t go out.
This was never the case with Scrivener. Write away, compile away, and worry about the structure later. This no longer is the case.

Just change the font RIGHT in the very opening panel of the compiler, it is simple; the UI helpfully tells you what is going to happen, suggests you can optionally map section types for a full text formatting override but does not enforce it!!! If you want a full override, then spend 10 seconds assigning section types, it isn’t rocket science! Why is it so hard to click “Assign section types…”!?

By default, Scrivener 2 also “compiles based on how text appears in the editor”…

Why not? You can assign section types at any point from your creation of the document to the instant before you click “Compile.”

If anything, separating “section types” from the “outline levels” used in Scrivener 2’s Compile function gives you more structural flexibility, not less.

Katherine

Compile was also the single largest cause of support questions and the single steepest part of the Scrivener learning curve.

Katherine