[Solved] Inconsistent results with Format Paintbrush

[paulindr]

The problem boils down to my having a line of text that appears to resist being formatted.


I had an existing Word-style document created outside Apache WRITER but opened with Writer. It has been opened and saved with Writer, several times now.

I located a heading formatted as style "Heading 2" (Outline numbered, Arial, Bold, 11 point, , All Caps). Heading 2's "Next Style" is "Default" (11 point, plain text, Arial, No Effects)
I used carriage return to move the heading down, incrementing its numbering (6.1 to 6.2) and leaving behind a new blank line numbered 6.1
I entered text into line 6.1 and it correctly adopted the Heading 2 style.
I hit carriage return to create a blank line. As the Heading 2 style lists the follow on text (next style) to be Default, I assumed that new text entered into the blank line would adopt the Default style.
I typed some words onto the blank line and they adopted a format equal to that of Heading 2 but not outline numbered (not numbered or bulleted).
I copied and pasted some normal (default style) text to add to the same line and it too adopted the format equal to that of Heading 2 but not outline numbered (not numbered or bulleted).

Expecting (needing) to rectify the unwanted formatting that has been adopted, I then selected Format Paintbrush. I clicked on some text (Default style) expecting the Format Paintbrush to copy the Default format. I then used the paintbrush to select the newly (most recently) created text below line 6.1. It had been reported (Styles and Formatting window) as having Default style but showed as if it had Heading 2 style (without numbering) and the paintbrush should have forced it to be Default style. But NOTHING changed. It is still reported as being "Default" style but still shows on the page as if it has Heading 2 style (without numbering).

I have tried Change Case (to force the all caps to become sentence case) but nothing changes.

I cannot determine why the style shown (in the Styles and Formatting Window) is "Default" but the appearance of the text actually resembles "Heading 2"(without numbering). I cannot determine why the actual formatting adopted (presumably inherited from somewhere) forces the text styling to remain constant no matter what I try to do to it.

I have uploaded a copy of my document with most content removed, leaving only enough to demonstrate the problem. The document contains the offending text below line numbered 6.1 and some plain text of Style "Default" (at the end) to use with Format Painter.

I'm looking for a solution to reformat the text. Yes, I know I could just delete it and type in something new but I want a solution in case the same happens with significantly more text. I'd also appreciate know why this happened so I can avoid the problem

Incidentally, Format Paintbrush has not been consistent elsewhere. I have added text copied form external documents into Writer, inside a paragraph formatted as "Default". The Default text was 11 point. The pasted text adopted 12 point and a different font. I could not use Format Paintbrush to successful convert the pasted text to "Default" format. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. I'm not sure why this would prove so difficult.

I admit that this is my first document using Apache OpenOffice, so maybe I'm missing something obvious? But I've used WPS Writer for years (until it annoyed me one time too many) and previously used Microsoft Word since it was first released (yes, THAT long). So I'm not sure why this is so difficult!

Thanks for any advice.

[FJCC]

Select all of the text that you want to change and then press CTRL + M or the menu item Format -> Default Formatting. This removes manually applied formatting. Manually applied formatting overrides styles.

I strongly suggest that you save the document in the native odt format. This will preserve formatting reliably.

[Bill]

The problem is caused by direct formatting applied to the first heading. When you hit Enter to start a Default paragraph, the new paragraph inherits the direct formatting from the heading. The direct formatting overrides the settings in the Default paragraph style.

Right-click the Default paragraph and select "Character". The Character dialog indicates that the "Capitals" font effect has been applied to the paragraph but it's not in the Default paragraph style. The paragraph could only have inherited the "Capitals" font effect from direct formatting of the previous heading. You can prove this by removing the "Capitals" font effect from the Heading 2 style. The first heading will retain the "Capitals" font effect, but the second heading will revert to normal text.

[paulindr]

To both FJJC and Bill, thanks so much.

I guessed that inheritance must be the problem but moving on from there was mystifying, especially as my habits are all from WPS Writer.

Both your answers are excellent and really helpful and I'm grateful for the effort in advising me. I hope to quickly find my way around OpenOffice. It's already impressed me, especially with Outline Numbering (WPS frustrated me to hell). If embedded images don't all jump around randomly when editing text (another WPS let-down), I'll be thrilled with this app set.

Cheers.

[Zizi64]

If embedded images don't all jump around randomly when editing text (another WPS let-down), I'll be thrilled with this app set.

It is depends on that:
- how you anchored the image (to the page, to the paragraph, to a character, as a character...).
- how you set the wrap text property of the image (No wrap, Page wrap, Optimal wrap, Wrap trough...).