No mention of either in the Scrivener3 manual.
The section of the manual that discusses these files is found in B.1.1 Preference Presets and Themes. But you’re right, it does look like I failed to mentioned the file extensions themselves, so that one can work backward from there. I’ve added a note to check file extensions in general (all of the special ones Scrivener uses), and will most likely create a table of them with cross-references to where they are discussed.
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An .stheme is a (scrivener) theme. You can either load it directly via the Load Theme from File command that section talks about, or drop it into your “Themes” subfolder, when using the
Scrivener ▸ Reveal Support Folder in Findermenu command. It will then appear in theScrivener ▸ Theme ▸subfolder (if not immediately, after a restart).Themes only change appearance settings, though they may even more narrow in their scope than that. It depends on what options were selected when it was saved. For example I have a theme the only changes fonts, so I can test other people’s themes without losing my preferred interface fonts.
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.prefs are everything, in the preferences window, including theme settings at the time of saving it. They can be loaded or saved via the “…Preferences from File” command, again referenced in that section of the manual.
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Yes I saw that .stheme and .prefs file extentions were not mentioned in the manual, thats why I asked. When I save a scrivenewr theme, no .stheme file appears in the Scrivener folder in the System Library folders. Wait, I seem to be wrong. But the confusing part is that both Settings and Themes are saved to the same “Themes” folder. Is this true? AmberV, what is your official affiliation or title or position with Litterature & Latte?
Where are the Project Settings stored? Can I save a project setting template pref file or theme? Are Project Settings saved with the main Scrivener Settings .prefs file? Confusing as hell.
Yes, that’s right, all preference and theme presets are saved into the Themes subfolder. It is not quite logical, I do agree, but one of those things that happened as a domino effect of another happening. Themes were added, then preference presets seemed like a logical conclusion, so it all ended up together.
AmberV, what is your official affiliation or title or position with Litterature & Latte?
Whew. Titles, right. Documentation, webmaster/IT, QA on all products, head of customer support, project lead for Windows development, design consultant for both software and artistic direction… maybe it is better to say: that small business person that fills in all of gaps, and has a todo list that would make a black hole jealous. 
Where are the Project Settings stored? Can I save a project setting template pref file or theme? Are Project Settings saved with the main Scrivener Settings .prefs file? Confusing as hell.
Well to start with the probably unnecessarily technical answer: It depends on whether the setting might be of use cross-platform. Our general rule of thumb is that if it is a workflow setting, such as whether label colours tint icons, then it should be saved into the project, so that loading on Mac or Windows works the same. On the other hand, the precise shape of the window, and where it is on the display, will be of little use to Windows (or vice versa), so this kind of information is stored in the main .plist, under ~/Library/Preferences.
As for the practical answer: most everything you might want to save about a project’s view settings can be done with Layouts, via the Window ▸ Layouts ▸ Manage Layouts command. This is a really useful feature if you tend to switch up how the window works on a regular basis. If you’ve ever used Adobe products, you may be familiar with the concept. It’s also a good way of transferring your preferred setup from one project to another.
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It is probably the acceleration caused by
that ensures you can respond to so many of us. Thank you for that.
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