Hello! Fairly new user, here… I compiled my project partway through writing because I needed a PDF of the whole doc as it was. Now I want to go back and keep working, but my project and daily targets are zeroed out. In other words, I want to see the whole manuscript word count and keep going with my targets but I can’t. I’ve gathered from some forums that to get word counts working again I need to reset my compile settings and make sure all parts of the project are selected there, but the sections I have already compiled don’t appear on the contents tab of the compile menu: I can’t select or deselect them. Any help appreciated!
The advice you’ve been given relates to setting your compile settings back to “normal”, which would be to select from the dropdown at the top of the Contents tab what should be counted, and click on the funnel icon beside it to make sure any filters are turned off. Refer to Figure 23.6 in the user manual PDF, items marked ⓐ and ⓑ, if you are unsure of where these settings are.
Statistics can be based on what you see in the list in that Contents tab. So with the right settings, if you don’t have anything in that list, nothing will be counted, as you have observed. You can also choose to ignore such compile settings with the right options in your statistics window (whichever you are using, look for the checkbox to Count current compile group only, which isn’t very reliable if you set the compile group dropdown to “Current Selection”, for example.
So whether to change your compile settings back, or adjust your stats settings, depends on your workflow mostly. Those that often compile bits and pieces but consider those bits and pieces all part of a whole would want to adjust the statistics options. Those that are selecting parts of the compiler in a more static fashion (like having multiple books of a trilogy in the draft folder) would want stats to stick to the compile group.