# Grrrr: How to Scrivener Auto Chapter Numbers?



## Deke (May 18, 2013)

I'm trying to compile an MS in Scrivener for Kindle. It's going well, but for the life of me I can't get scrivener to create an auto chapter numbers and a TOC. I don't want it to list the titles of the chapter folders, just a list of number.  I know it's done somehow in compile, format, and those boxes.  Haven't found a tutorial that explains it.  Any suggestions?


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## DJ Edwardson (Mar 15, 2013)

When you select compile with the "format as" Ebook presets, the fourth option on the left is Formatting. It should say something like:

_CHAPTER ONE

Title_

When you select the top level 1. Then, to make sure it gets included in your ebook, make sure the option for "Generate HTML Table of Contents is selected in the Layout option (sixth on the Compilation Options list)

Hope that wasn't too general.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

Thanks, but that still doesn't work.  Or I'm doing it wrong. Selecting that top folder level results in a compile where the names of the folder are placed in the table of contents. So if I called the folder for chapter one "Chap 1" that is what appears in the TOC instead of "Chapter One" which is what I want.  And there are still no chapter headings in the text. I managed to get nice page separations between chapters, but no "Chapter One" in the larger hearder style font. 

What's aggravating is that I was able to do this once before, but not able to replicate it.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Deke said:


> Thanks, but that still doesn't work. Or I'm doing it wrong. Selecting that top folder level results in a compile where the names of the folder are placed in the table of contents. So if I called the folder for chapter one "Chap 1" that is what appears in the TOC instead of "Chapter One" which is what I want. And there are still no chapter headings in the text. I managed to get nice page separations between chapters, but no "Chapter One" in the larger hearder style font.
> 
> What's aggravating is that I was able to do this once before, but not able to replicate it.


Why don't you just manually remove the folder (take the interior contents out first), and type Chapter One at the top of the first page of Chapter One?


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## Monique (Jul 31, 2010)

This might help.

http://www.atfmb.com/2013/01/14/scrivener-quick-tip-building-an-ebook-part-1/


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## 75814 (Mar 12, 2014)

In the compile window, click on Formatting, and for the Section Type, select whether or not you want the title of the folder to appear. If you don't want to use the title, then uncheck the Title box next to the folder. Then click on Section Layout, this is where you control what the prefix and suffix of each chapter will be. The default prefix is "Chapter <$t>", where <$t> is the chapter number. In the window at the bottom of the Formatting screen, you can control how the chapter heading will look. If "Title" appears, that means it will use the folder name.

So if you just want the number without the chapter tag and no title, then make sure the Title box isn't checked and in Section Layout, it should only say <$t> in the title prefix.

Hopefully I'm understanding the problem correctly.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

Thanks Perry, that is the problem, but for some reason unchecking "title" and setting up the prefix/suffix isn't working. I still get no chapters in the text and the TOC is still the titles.  I must have clicked on some other box that is having this effect.  Tomorrow I'll try just naming the folders "Chapter One" etc and then see if using the titles as the effect I'm after.


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## 75814 (Mar 12, 2014)

I wonder if maybe your settings in Title Adjustments is the problem? Try this: in the compile window, click on Title Adjustments. Look at where it says "Do not add title prefix or suffix to documents:" and click on the gear button. Make sure your chapters *aren't* checked.

That's the only other thing I can think of that might be causing the problem. Although I do recommend titling your folders by chapter number. I've found it helps make these things easier.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

I just use this sort of thing in scrivener as my chapter headers: 1 ~ Murder

BUT, each of my chapters is a file within its own folder. The folder for the above AND the file in it will be called: 1 ~ Murder

And my settings for compile look like this:



















EDIT: This works perfectly on my scrivener for windows, but I don't use any kind of auto numbering. I don't miss that auto feature, I like control over what appears and I like knowing it will appear in the final ebook exactly as I decide it should look.


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## Tim_A (May 25, 2013)

I posted these in another Scrivener thread a week or two ago. The poster was trying to do the exact opposite of you, but they still apply, only in reverse, IYSWIM.



















So, do the opposite to what I scrawled...

In the Formatting tab, select the top level folder (in Scrivener, Chapters & parts are folders, and scenes are the documents in the folder. You can nest them to give, for example Part 1, Chapter 1, Scene 1). Make sure Title is untucked. This'll stop Scrivener from using the folder title as the chapter title.

Then in the Section Layout dialog, the title prefix & suffix tab lets you specify the "Chapter N" text (suffix comes after the title text if you have it enabled, and prefix before). Use <$w> to spell the number out. There are lots of ways to format the chapter number - 2, two, ii, II etc - on the Scrivener Help menu, select "Placeholder Tags List" to get the full list.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

Thanks. I'll give these things a try and report back.  Part of the confusion is terminology. Just what the heck is a prefix and suffix in this context? It also doesn't help that the Compile function seems to reset each time open the program. There should be a way to save the settings I've made and give them a name.  Option clicking turns "compile" into "save" but doesnt' give me a naming option.


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## Leanne King (Oct 2, 2012)

Deke said:


> It also doesn't help that the Compile function seems to reset each time open the program. There should be a way to save the settings I've made and give them a name. Option clicking turns "compile" into "save" but doesnt' give me a naming option.


It certainly should save the options you set. If you change them then back out without compiling, they won't save, otherwise, they will.

You can name and save as many different settings setups as you want - click the "Format As" drop down at the top of the Compile screen then choose "Manage Custom Format Presets..." and you can save them there, as well as import and export them (useful if you use multiple machines - I export all mine to a dropbox folder).


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## dkgould (Feb 18, 2013)

Pelagios said:


> It certainly should save the options you set. If you change them then back out without compiling, they won't save, otherwise, they will.
> 
> You can name and save as many different settings setups as you want - click the "Format As" drop down at the top of the Compile screen then choose "Manage Custom Format Presets..." and you can save them there, as well as import and export them (useful if you use multiple machines - I export all mine to a dropbox folder).


 Yeah, that's saved me a ton of time and frustration. I now have a kindle preset and a paperback preset (because I'm stooopid and always forget to change the margins in paperback until createspace yells at me) It's helped not only when I update but also as a quick setup for new books too (can still tweak but at least the basics are covered the way I like now).


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Deke said:


> Thanks. I'll give these things a try and report back. Part of the confusion is terminology. Just what the heck is a prefix and suffix in this context? It also doesn't help that the Compile function seems to reset each time open the program. There should be a way to save the settings I've made and give them a name. Option clicking turns "compile" into "save" but doesnt' give me a naming option.


Look at my pictures above. See where it says save preset? Set all the options you want including all the meta data and everything, then click save preset. Enter a name in the box and tadah! You now have saved a preset. What's great about this is you can create one as your default, but then for every book you load that one, change the cover, and resave as a new name. Now you have a default AND a preset customised for that book.


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## Speaker-To-Animals (Feb 21, 2012)

All I can say about the frustration is that usually once you figure out how to do something, Scrivener makes it ludicrously easy.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

This has become one of the most frustrating experiences with Scrivener.  It should not be this counter intuitive.  

The good news is I discovered one  hiccup: the in the Compile...Contents  all the folders have to be checked. I had unchecked the folders...thinking that I didn't want them included as there is no text in them, just the text documents.  So with them checked, I get some Chapter headings.

I've also been dealing with the fact that Compile doesn't save settings. So I'd try one approach...fail...try again only to discover that instead of "Format as Ebook" it's become "Custom" or some other such magical shift.  So now that I can save settings my trial and error will hopefully be progressive.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Deke said:


> This has become one of the most frustrating experiences with Scrivener. It should not be this counter intuitive.
> 
> The good news is I discovered one hiccup: the in the Compile...Contents all the folders have to be checked. I had unchecked the folders...thinking that I didn't want them included as there is no text in them, just the text documents. So with them checked, I get some Chapter headings.
> 
> I've also been dealing with the fact that Compile doesn't save settings. So I'd try one approach...fail...try again only to discover that instead of "Format as Ebook" it's become "Custom" or some other such magical shift. So now that I can save settings my trial and error will hopefully be progressive.


Scriv defaults to custom when you change something. So let's say you selected a preset called My Book but noticed a tick was missing. You click it, and the preset changes to custom because, well, you just customised something. To make the change stick to the My Book preset, you have to save it again as the same name and it will overwrite the old My Book preset.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

It's frustrating. The terminology is confusing.  None more so than the Title Adjustment panel. When I see Title I think the title of the novel.  There are tick boxes for "Do not add title prefix to front matter documents." What is that referring to? Maybe this should read "do not include front matter in table of contents."  There is also a glitch in that some boxes say "include front matter", but in the contents list you can uncheck those boxes. So sometime my compiles have front matter and other times they don't. And while I'm on a rant, the words "contents" makes me think of "table of contents" not the contents of the whole novel. 

I'll get the hang of it. It's only taken me 30 tries and counting.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

An update: I gave up on auto generating Chapter headings.  It proved impossible to have the first chapter be labeled "Prologue" and the last as "Epilogue."

--So I renamed all folders how I want them to appear in the text.  Chapter One, Chapter Two, etc.
--For this to work in Compile....Formatting I checked the "title" box by the folder icon.
--In the same panel in Section Layout, I leave the "title prefix and suffix" blank so no auto chapter headings are generated.
--this sets up chapter headings well, and creates a TOC with the right headings.

But...for some reason the front matter is included in the TOC. How do I stop this? Unticking those boxes in the Compile...Contents section deletes them from the document.  Where is the "don't put front matter in the TOC" button?


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Deke said:


> An update: I gave up on auto generating Chapter headings. It proved impossible to have the first chapter be labeled "Prologue" and the last as "Epilogue."
> 
> --So I renamed all folders how I want them to appear in the text. Chapter One, Chapter Two, etc.
> --For this to work in Compile....Formatting I checked the "title" box by the folder icon.
> ...


Honestly, it doesn't have to be this difficult. I recommend you utilize my prior suggestion, or: in the list on the left, title each separate page as Chapter One, etc.., and put the front matter on a separate page without a title if you like. The TOC generates automatically based on the titles of the pages in that list. Look here: https://plus.google.com/photos/108155601641892969907/albums/5857620678329675393?authkey=CPqXtPu1g8nVfQ

And if you want to see the end result, you can check my look inside from the book cover in my sig.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

"Why don't you just manually remove the folder (take the interior contents out first), and type Chapter One at the top of the first page of Chapter One?"

Thanks, but I don't think that would create a Table of Contents. To create a HTML TOC for Kindle, I think folders are needed. The alternative, apparently, is to create another folder and manually set hyperlinks between the chapter and it's corresponding start. There are also some unique aspects to my novel: I use a prologue and an epilogue, and some interstitial paragraphs between chapters (but separated by breaks) so that complicates the use of their automatic chapter numbering system. 

I've given up on not having the front matter in the TOC. I'll live with that. But I want to find a way for the interstitial bits to not be in the TOC. Now I'm experimenting with how those bits are arranged in the binder.

If Scrivener is listening: In future editions just add another collumn to the Compile/Contents box.  This new collumn would be called TOC and enable folks to tick boxes on what elements should be listed in the TOC.


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## Victoria Champion (Jun 6, 2012)

Deke said:


> "Why don't you just manually remove the folder (take the interior contents out first), and type Chapter One at the top of the first page of Chapter One?"
> 
> Thanks, but I don't think that would create a Table of Contents. To create a HTML TOC for Kindle, I think folders are needed.


Incorrect. I have published all my books without using folders and have always had a TOC. Did you see the rest of my post above and look at the link? Anyway I don't know how else to explain it, so maybe someone else can help you figure it out. Good luck.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Deke said:


> "Why don't you just manually remove the folder (take the interior contents out first), and type Chapter One at the top of the first page of Chapter One?"
> 
> Thanks, but I don't think that would create a Table of Contents. To create a HTML TOC for Kindle, I think folders are needed. The alternative, apparently, is to create another folder and manually set hyperlinks between the chapter and it's corresponding start. There are also some unique aspects to my novel: I use a prologue and an epilogue, and some interstitial paragraphs between chapters (but separated by breaks) so that complicates the use of their automatic chapter numbering system.
> 
> ...


I have individual folders for neatness no other reason, and it lets me close and hide text docs that I consider finished. That way when I open scriv there is one folder open, the one I am working on. Every separate text doc becomes an entry in the toc if you put the tick next to it in the compile window. So use a text doc for every chapter, one for about the author, one for more titles BY the author, one for the copyright page, one for the excerpt of the next book, one for the front matter.

Sounds a lot of work, but its not because you can literally recycle all that crap for the next book only making small corrections to things like pub date and title. Its great. What I do, is once finished and the book is all done. I just copy the entire project to a new folder, change its name, delete all the chapters BUT NOT the folders containing all those extras, and start again with my new book. Doing this means all the front and back matter is already done, has the same format (so all my books look homogeneous to my imprint) and only needs basic editing to match the new project.

Add 30 or so folders and text docs for you chapters, and begin writing. All done, and when you compile, you KNOW the only thing different in the final epub will be the chapter content and names, not the final design. All my ebooks have what I consider MY imprint's look and feel to them.


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## Deke (May 18, 2013)

"So use a text doc for every chapter"

It's an interesting option, but what if your have different "scene" within each chapter? Do you include all scened into one text doc?  And then separate the scene with just a paragraph return?


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Deke said:


> "So use a text doc for every chapter"
> 
> It's an interesting option, but what if your have different "scene" within each chapter? Do you include all scened into one text doc? And then separate the scene with just a paragraph return?


Don't ever use blank lines because often an ereading device will ignore them. Use the formatting to to add space before the paragraph. I have one text doc in each folder, but I know others use a doc per scene and so have multiple docs in each folder. It's personal choice really.

I actually don't write in scrivener. I use a handheld machine. Very ancient. Then paste that into word, use that in my template to get it looking nice and then paste it into a text doc in scrivener. I primarily use scriv to organise scenes and chapters into the final order, edit it all in the one place, and compile it into epub.


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## Cheryl M. (Jan 11, 2011)

Deke said:


> I've also been dealing with the fact that Compile doesn't save settings. So I'd try one approach...fail...try again only to discover that instead of "Format as Ebook" it's become "Custom" or some other such magical shift. So now that I can save settings my trial and error will hopefully be progressive.


Honestly, it's not as hard as it sounds. If you can't figure out how to make your own presets or use the compile, Scrivener has set it up so you don't have to. You can set it to "original" instead of choosing a preset. Then you can set everything to compile "as is," and you can set it all up the way you want IN your files. WYSIWYG, essentially. (Personally, I prefer controlling it all on my own and compile "as is" all the time.) It's also easy once you get the hang of how to use the folders and sub folders and files and such for compiling, but it does take a great deal of effort to learn how to make Scrivener bend to your will when you want to use the compile features. For the longest time I couldn't get the chapters to not number epilogues and prologues and sheesh, what a nightmare. But I figured it out. It's not that hard if you just keep in mind that compile is based on levels. Everything you want to do needs to be in a separate level if it needs to have separate compile settings. A chapter title can't be the same level as a scene, and an epilogue can't be the same level as a chapter. I think PC has a way to actually exclude things from certain compile settings, but I'm not sure. In Mac, you just make sure everything has separate levels for separate formatting rules. Youtube has a ton of vids that will walk you through the process.


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## 75814 (Mar 12, 2014)

Deke said:


> An update: I gave up on auto generating Chapter headings. It proved impossible to have the first chapter be labeled "Prologue" and the last as "Epilogue."
> 
> --So I renamed all folders how I want them to appear in the text. Chapter One, Chapter Two, etc.
> --For this to work in Compile....Formatting I checked the "title" box by the folder icon.
> ...


It's not impossible to have the first and last chapters labeled differently, but it can be trickier. Automatic chapter numbering is best used for people who are going to use the same chapter headings throughout the book, i.e. Chapter 1, Chapter 2, etc. Through the Title Adjustments options, you can make it so that the prologue and epilogue don't use the title prefix, but then you'll have to use folder titles anyway. However, you can create additional formatting levels, but it's far easier to just consistently name your folders the way you want them displayed.

As far as removing front matter from the TOC, I wouldn't worry about it. For starters, I have yet to see an ebook, either traditionally or self-published, that didn't have front matter documents in the TOC. If you're really that concerned about it, the best thing to do is to just consolidate. Instead of having a separate folder for each front matter document, just create one folder called Front Matter and put your title, copyright, and dedication (if applicable) pages in there.


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## Michael Alan Peck (May 8, 2013)

Everyone else is providing good advice and different options, so I'll just weigh in with a few words of overall support. Scrivener can be frustrating at first because there's a definite learning curve, and you're used to doing things another way. But if you stick with it enough to set up your own templates and compile settings and really become familiar with it, it's worth it. I liked it enough to go on faith and figure that I'd learn what I needed to do eventually.

I did. And I'm happy as hell with it. But again, hang in there. It can be a little maddening when you're new to it.


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## 69959 (May 14, 2013)

Tim_A said:


> I posted these in another Scrivener thread a week or two ago. The poster was trying to do the exact opposite of you, but they still apply, only in reverse, IYSWIM.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You, sir, are my new best friend. I've been trying to figure this out forever!


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## Guest (Jan 31, 2015)

Holy necropost Batman!

Sorry to resurrect this, but I had the same problem and found this thread.  For me, the fix was really simple, I just had to uncheck "Compile As-Is" from the chapters and scenes (Scrivener help guy figured this out, I can provide his explanation if anyone wants it).

I know Mr. Deke has moved on from this problem months ago.  But thought I'd bump this in case someone else runs into the same problem.

Cheers...


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## Brevoort (Jan 27, 2014)

Adly Teoh said:


> For me, the fix was really simple, I just had to uncheck "Compile As-Is" from the chapters and scenes (Scrivener help guy figured this out, I can provide his explanation if anyone wants it). . . thought I'd bump this in case someone else runs into the same problem.


Yes please, I'd like to read Scrivener's advice on this. I am having a somewhat similar problem and I'm not quite understanding the advice contained in this thread.


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## Guest (Jan 31, 2015)

Brevoort said:


> Yes please, I'd like to read Scrivener's advice on this. I am having a somewhat similar problem and I'm not quite understanding the advice contained in this thread.


PM inbound.

Cheers...


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## Peter Spenser (Jan 26, 2012)

Brevoort said:


> Yes please, I'd like to read Scrivener's advice on this. I am having a somewhat similar problem and I'm not quite understanding the advice contained in this thread.


I mentioned this in another thread: consider buying the e-book *Beautiful eBooks With Scrivener* by N.R. Wick. It's very short and to the point, and it specifically, and clearly, covers the Compile function and is one of the best $2.99 that I've ever spent.


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