Adding text to headers for long document

[Siarach]

I am working on a very long document which has well over 100 pages. In the past with smaller documents, when I typed in a small reference in the first header, it was automatically repeated in all the headers to the end of the document. This is not happening for me with this document. Any ideas as to what I am doing wrong, or am I expecting too much? Siarach

[RoryOF]

Check that you are not using a different Page Style for that page. The Page Style in use (under the cursor) is shown in the middle of the Status Bar.

[Siarach]

Thank you for your reply. I am sorry, but I do not understand what your are saying. Could you please give more detail. Siarach.

[RoryOF]

[Tutorial] Page styles and headers/footers

[Siarach]

I have been through the tutorial, and it has little to say about my problem. It was mostly concerned with changing styles. I am not changing styles. I simply want to insert a reference in the first header, and expect it to be carried forward to the end of the document, but it will not do it as I used to get it to do on smaller documents. However, I discovered that where there was a large blank area at the bottom of a page as at the end of a chapter, the reference was not carried forward. I had to jump all these gaps by putting in the reference again after each gap. It was laborious, but I got through it. Is there a solution to this problem which I might need in future? Incidentally, I had to do the same with the page numbers. Do I just have to accept this, or is there a solution? Siarach.

[keme]

... I had to jump all these gaps by putting in the reference again after each gap. It was laborious, but I got through it. Is there a solution to this problem which I might need in future? Incidentally, I had to do the same with the page numbers. Do I just have to accept this, or is there a solution? Siarach.

Yes there is a solution:
Do not use Microsoft Word to work with your document when your main tool is OpenOffice Writer, and do not save the working copy as a MS Word "doc" file. Only use Word when you have to, as a final export to submit to your publisher, and to check that the file is useable with Word. Only do this if the publisher/print service insists that their input be a Word document. Make sure you ask at least twice whether they are able to handle odt files.

Writer manages page layout transitions using page styles. MS Word does not know about page styles, but stores any change in page layout as special properties of a paragraph. When this type of formatting codes is fed back to Writer, the import filters of Writer tries to make the best out of any such properties it finds. Those properties may be residue from previous tentative format changes and have no visual impact at all. They still cause Writer to create and apply page styles en masse. The problem may escalate with each transition between Word and Writer context (a transition which happens twice when you open a doc file with Writer, then saves it again).