Scrivener automatically adding links to random text

Scrivener Scrivener for macOS
1

Scrivener is automatically adding links to random text in the main editor. It happens whenever I modify previously written text, i.e. text that was in the document when I opened it. The links appear as hyperlinks but do not in fact link to anything. This is the first time this problem has occurred, but it now occurs consistently. Perhaps an option got ticked when I upgraded to Catalina and/or the newest version of Scrivener? I’m running macOS 10.15.2 and Scrivener 3.1.5. This issue is sort of debilitating, requiring me to constantly “Remove link” to text. Any help would be hugely appreciated.

I made of the issue since it’s not the easiest thing to explain: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1kwGfrujE_3iPdWaZ8R3oZITnxCSMB1x-. (Here’s hoping the video’s done processing by the time you read this!)

Thanks!

2

I just came looking for an answer to this same issue. This started occurring right after upgrading to Catalina. I am running the same macOS and Scrivener versions (macOS 10.15.2 and Scrivener 3.1.5) and experiencing the same issue. Only difference for me is that clicking “Remove Link” doesn’t remove the links. I have to delete the linked text and rewrite the text to solve the issue. I feel like the links are mostly being applied to pasted text and/or previously commented on text, but I’m not exactly sure since it is happening so often, it’s hard to keep track of the cause.

I’m hoping by replying here, I may bump this concern up and get a response because it’s really hindering my writing. Thank you!

3

It’s likely these links are actually old comment links. There was a bug that could cause the link part of a comment to remain in the text, and while we fixed part of it, there were some side-effects to the fix that made it even easier to end up with them. There is no way to strip these links out with tools, because the tools are designed to intentionally ignore comment links (the link part being a technical component and not really something most would consider to be an actual link, per se—you can imagine that if you used a bulk link removal tool and stripped all footnotes and comments out, it would not be the desired result!).

So the only way to remove them is to manually strip them out. The easiest way to do this is to double-click on the word to the left of the link, drag all the way over to the word on the right, so that the link and the two words around it are entirely selected, and then Cut and use Edit ▸ Paste and Match Style to paste as “plain-text”.

The underlying problem itself will be fixed in the next update.