Apache OpenOffice Community Forum

Hello! I am a new user and I have searched for the answer to my question but I am afraid that I may be using the wrong terminology to find it. When I open a new document, it automatically has a gray border/grid/margin/frame/box/lines around it.

When I type, the type appears inside this "box", right against it with no padding. I want to get rid of this "box". I have looked everywhere to find instructions to no avail.

How do I get rid of this gray box that is on every document?

Thanks for anything you can share.

Hi and welcome to the forums.

This is the text boundaries box, and it shows the limits of the text area on the page. It doesn't print, it is for on-screen use only.

To turn it off, go to View and then uncheck Text Boundaries.

If this has answered your question please go to your first post and use the Edit button, and add [Solved] to the start of the title. You can use the green tick icon at the same time if you like.

View > Text Boundaries: OFF

You may want to consider, instead of turning the lines off altogether, to visit Tools > Options > OOo > General > Appearance > General > Text boundaries, and change the color to something less distracting, but still visible.

I can't thank you enough! I knew it would be something simple...I just didn't have the right terminology.

Thank you! It was a huge distraction .

I have seen several versions of this question and answer, to simply uncheck the Text Boundaries in View. However, I have that unchecked, but still have that type of border line around different parts of my text. They seem to be defined sections, since, when I hit ctrl Home, it goes to the top on that box, rather than the top of the document. How do I get rid of this? The document used to be a Word doc. The only way I've found to get rid of it is to copy & paste the different sections into a new document.

Yes, those are sections.

Format > Sections ... select the appropriate section(s), click "Remove".

This only removes the section "container" the text within the section is unchanged.

Thanks. That worked. However, I would like to know how to leave the sections unchanged, but not show the lines around them. Text Boundaries is unchecked regardless of which section I am in.

Try changing the boundary and divider lines to be the page background colour. Look in /Tools /Option /OpenOffice /Appearance; you will need to select the identical colour..

Dr DC wrote:... I would like to know how to leave the sections unchanged, but not show the lines around them. ...

Oops! Sorry, I missed that.

Tools > Options > OO > Appearance > Text Document > Section boundaries: OFF

Note that such things are only visible in the editing view. If you need to see a clean preview, use File > Page Preview.

Thanks! That's great to know!

I have tried all of these suggested solutions, and the only one that (sort of) works is viewing online. But that makes other changes. How do I get these distracting gray rectangles to disappear?

OOo 2.3.X on Ms Windows XP

Please update your signature and/or upgrade your office suite.

How do I update my signature?

In the header of the webpage: User Control Panel - Profile TAB - Edit signature sub-TAB.

oneota wrote:I have tried all of these suggested solutions, and the only one that (sort of) works is viewing online. But that makes other changes. How do I get these distracting gray rectangles to disappear?

Go to Tools > Options > OpenOffice > Appearance and uncheck everything with "boundaries" in the name. If that doesn't do it, then upload a sample document.

I don't see how to attach a file here. how do I do that?

See viewtopic.php?f=74&t=8289

The tab was barely visible (not much tone contrast between to box and the text) on my screen. That 's why I said I couldn't see it.

Those things appear to be multiple examples of non-breaking spaces. First time I think I have ever seen this.

To see what I mean, open a new file and go
Insert > Formatting Mark > Non-breaking space (or something like that. I am using LO so the sequence may be a bit difference but start at Insert)

Where did that material come from?

The reason for their presence seems to be a crude attempt to format a reference list in something like a sociology or maybe MLA format or an antiquated APA format. What they are doing is giving you the required indent in the second line of each reference.

I assume, without more information, that this was deliberate. To get rid of them just select and do a Find and Replace All.

If you need to keep the format, just create a new paragraph Style that will do it properly.

Edit: Oops overly optimistic here as you may need to manually remove that paragraph marker on the first line of each reference

/View /Field shadings turned them off when I used it on your uploaded file. They will not print as grey rectangles whether that setting is on or off.

/view/field shadings: The perfect solution. Thank You.