Hello,
I have a bunch of right-aligned text in my project that goes left when I try to compile for print or PDF. ‘Preserve Formatting’ is checked, but that doesn’t seem to make a difference.
How can I get the compile function to keep the alignment formatting I’ve used in my text?
Thanks
I think I found the answer, in case anyone else is looking.
My first step was to make sure all my headings and scenes had the layout types applied. For scenes I chose the ‘section’ layout. Then, in the Compile module, under ‘Section Layouts’ in the middle, I hovered over the ‘section’ layout demo so the pencil icon showed in the upper-right corner. This is where I edited the section type layout and unchecked ‘Override Text and Notes Formatting’.
I also wanted the font to be different and single line-spacing. To the right of the ‘Override’ checkbox, there’s a little broom icon with yet another checkbox option to ‘Preserve Uncommon Alignment’. I figured I could check that box, and play around with the formatting options, but computer says no.
In the end, I changed the font in the main Compile module (this changed the font for my headings and body text, but I can work with that), and when I compiled in Word, I just changed the line-spacing to single. The important thing is that the right-aligned text is right-aligned.
This video helped me make sense of Compile (since a lot of the answers I found online seemed to refer to an older version of Scrivener), so thank you to the person that created it…
Scrivener 3 Compile Tutorial (Full Explanation & Demo) on YouTube
And thank you, me.
Glad you got it figured out.
In the new version, often the best tool for this job will be Styles. Since it is likely that you’ll want to apply special formatting to a number of different pieces of text, having a unified style for them all can help keep their formatting in tune with one another, since you can modify the style centrally. More importantly, styles are a way of protecting formatting from the compiler. A paragraph-only style would protect alignment, but allow the compiler to continue setting the font and so forth, while a paragraph+character style will preserve all aspects.