[Solved] Autocorrect to capitalize first letter of sentence

[edward205]

I tried to activate autocorrect in order to capitalize the first letter of each sentence. However, it still does not work. Any ideas?

[acknak]

Greetings and welcome to the community forum!

Some things to check:

Format > AutoCorrect > While Typing: ON

Tools > AutoCorrect > Options > Options > Capitalize the first letter of every sentence: ON (both M and T)

Document Language (look at the status bar below the editing area); you should see your correct language there, and NOT "None" or nothing.
(I don't think this actually matters for auto-capitalization but it's worth a look anyway.)

File > New > Text Document
Start typing, all lower case. The first space you type, the first word should automatically capitalize.

[edward205]

Thank you. It worked perfectly.
edward

[furdeal]

I have the opposite problem. OpenOffice autocorrects "(i.e. etc...." to "(I.e. etc...." I have gone into Tools > AutoCorrect Options > Options tab and unchecked Capitalize first letter of every sentence. That didn't work. So I went into Tools > Options > Language Settings > Writing Aids and unchecked Check capitalization. That also didn't work. I don't want to turn off autocorrect because then I can't type curly quotes. Any suggestion?

[furdeal]

Nevermind. I just discovered that autocorrect was replacing "i." with "I." for some reason. I deleted this pair from the list and now it works fine.

[acknak]

The simplest thing, if you don't want to turn it off, is to type Ctrl+z when it changes. That will undo the auto change and leave your original typing but without changing any settings.

Next easiest is to use Format > AutoCorrect > While Typing: OFF That turns off most auto changes but it's relatively easy to turn off and on as needed.

If you want to turn off this particular change, look at Tools > AutoCorrect Options > Replace. Scroll down to the "i"s and remove the i to I replacement. (I see you've already found this one).

You may want to reconsider removing that one: I find that to be one of the more helpful replacements.

You can disable the replacement with Tools > AutoCorrect Options > Options > Use replacement table: OFF

[CanA]

Hi Acknak,

I have Open Office 4.1.6 on macOS High Sierra 10.13.5,

I tried everything you wrote on your first response, my Open Office still does not auto capitalize.
Right now:
Format -> Autocorrect -> While typing is ON
Tools > AutoCorrect Options > Capitalize first letter of every sentence is CHECKED (both M&T)

It actually does autocapitalize, ONLY for the first line of a document, then it doesn't for the following lines.
I even deleted the program and reinstalled it, nope, still the same..

What else can I do?
THANKS!

[RoryOF]

I have checked on my computer and found that it does work.

I checked with sentences terminated by full stops, exclamations and question marks, spaced off these by single or double spaces or a tab. In all cases, the new sentence was autocaptitalized, as soon as the first word was terminated by a space. If the sentence terminator I have listed above was not followed by a space, then no autocapitaliszation occurred. Closing quotes or > did not act as sentence terminators.

This worked on all lines of the text, not merely the first line.

[CanA]

I just checked now,
Mine works if I use: . or ?
When I use: , or ; or : then it does not work, regardless of leaving or not a space after the mark.

[RoryOF]

, ; or : are not sentence terminators. They introduce subclauses, not new sentences and typically such clauses are not capitalized in normal typesetting.

You may find it of interest to consult "The Elements of Typographic Style" by Robert Bringhurst, probably the bible on typesetting.

[CanA]

Of course they are not terminators..
However, I need to prepare these docs this way, for some very complicated reason, and,
Luckily, MS Office on my Vaio capitalizes any new line, regardless of what was there above.
But I love my Mac and I really like Open Office much more than MS.

So, the quest still continues...

?