I know that I used this Text Tidying menu on a previous manuscript to remove multiple spaces, but when I try to do that with my current manuscript, the menu is greyed out. Even when I select the text, this menu can’t be accessed. What am I doing wrong? Thanks!
There doesn’t seem to be a universal problem with the feature, I’m afraid we’d need a little more information to go on. For example, what steps do I need to take, starting from the creation of a new blank test project, to see the menu command not become available while the cursor is in a text editor? It would also be helpful to know Scrivener and Mac version numbers.
I finally discovered that I need to select each scene and then the menu appears. I thought I’d remembered a more universal way to do this for the full manuscript, but perhaps I was wrong. This will suffice for now. Thanks!
Oh okay, yeah most of the commands in this menu require the cursor to be in the editor, and the risky one (to delete struck-through text) requires an active text selection. The general rule of thumb is that global commands that can be used on selected items in the binder are found in the Documents menu, as they operating on Documents (even if the net effect of that is to Edit the text).
That said, you can clear out messy spaces easily with Scrivenings mode. Just load the whole Draft into Scrivenings, make sure the cursor is in the editor, and run the command. No text selection is required for those commands that stay lit up with just a blinking cursor. That means all visible text will be cleaned.