Discrete pages

[Bekah]

CHET-NUN

Peace be unto you.

As a MS Publisher user, there are a few things in OpenOffice Writer that are difficult to understand at first.

How new pages are created (or inserted) presents a challenge. The flow from one page to the next is conceptually different between the two tools.

I try to explain with some screenshots on this working page:
http://temp.hawkshare.com
This is a sample from my sewing pattern work.

I am interested in making blocks of instructions which can stand alone, or be fitted tightly together as
Squares on a page. See related post:
http://user.services.openoffice.org/en/ ... f=7&t=1354

Thanks in advance for the helps.
J Bekah

[floris v]

How new pages are created (or inserted) presents a challenge. The flow from one page to the next is conceptually different between the two tools.

Quite true, and, honestly, even more so if you start with a word processor and make the move to dtp software.
That said, I'm not sure that I understand your problem. Normally text flows from one page to the next in a word processor, with no effort at all on the user's side. That's a good thing, IMO. You can however force a new page by hitting Ctrl+Enter.

How new pages are created (or inserted) presents a challenge.

You can't be serious. Nothing is easier.

I think that you suffer from a way of thinking that is not good for you. That way of thinking basically says that an office suite like OOo should be able to do anything text-related. Why go to great lengths to get the same effect with OOo that you get with Publisher with hardly any effort? It doesn't make sense. Peace. You can actually hammer a screw into a board but it's a fair bet that a screwdriver is better suited for the job. Screwdrivers and hammers are conceptually very different tools. Use them for what they were made for.

[acknak]

I have to agree with floris_v. It seems like you want a desktop publishing application, which OOo is not. Although you can use OOo to achieve almost everything you can do with MS Publisher, it requires a different approach to get there, and some things will be a lot harder to do in OOo

If you want discrete pages, you can use OOo Draw, but then you lose much of the text formatting capability of Writer.

[Bekah]

CHET-NUN means grace.
Sorry for the long delay. I have been multitasking, although sharpening my tools should be and is a high priority.

I thank you for the replies. It reveals that I may suffer from genre ignorance.

By whatever name it is called, what if I want things to flow to a new page only if I tell it to?

The control-enter command was not obvious, and honestly, while OOw is a powerful tool, the initial presentation is rather overwelming in quantity of selections to make. I prefer small stores to supermarkets. Many software tools, and more webpages are overcrowded.

Did you notice how some presentations are multi-level user friendly? I apologize if this request seems ungrateful, or demanding, but perhaps in some future inventive stage of growth, Open Office suite -- or some hybrid -- can adopt it.

You might tell me that configuring my own toolbars will address that problem. But I do not know what every icon and every tool means yet, and to configure to the best efficiency for my tasks would mean to study everything in advance. So, have mercy and show me the quick start guide packed with my new appliance.

They say some of us are learning disabled. But many, if not most of us, have spiritual talents that require small clear presentations, and lots of interactivity. It is called a learning style, not an inability.

Peace to you. Thanks again for the considered replies. I shall be pondering them, and working some more.

JB

[floris v]

Peace to you, too.

First, you aren't talking to the developers here. We're just users.

Word processors and DTP programs are as different as men and women. I have never worked with Publisher, but I toyed a bit with another DTP program, Scribus, which is highly recommended in this and the old OOo forum. Suffice to say that after a few fruitless hours I was exasperated into uninstalling it. I just couldn't make sense of it. I would probably do the same with Publisher. I'm fairly comfortable with word processors, however, possibly because I started with WordPerfect 5.1 for MS DOS 4.1 (not counting the word processor on my first computer, a Commodore 64 :p ) If you can survive WordPerfect 5.1 without a training, you can survive anything that came later. But Ctrl+Enter was a way of WP to start a new page in the 1980s, and it still is for all word processors that I'm aware of.

More seriously, a word processor is a tool to produce large or small amounts of flowing text. The default assumption for users of a word processor is that when their text reaches the bottom of a page, it continues on the next, with no effort on the writer's side. You want to do something different, so obviously it will be harder to achieve that. You can use frames and tables to have multiple small "pages" on a single page, with the content confined to it - a frame would be better to prevent text from flowing to another page - but it's basically your responsibility that your text fits in a rectangle with given dimensions, isn't it? All you can do beyond editing the text is manipulating the font size and line height to make the text fit, and for that, a DTP program is better suited than a simple word processor - and please note that even MS Word is a simple word processor.

The only way to get comfortable with a word processor is by using it, and, more importantly, to aimlessly meander through the menu options. Just look at all that's possible, and make a mental note of what you think may come in useful.

Please, nobody here is accusing anybody of a learning disability. Peace. We are friendly people, even I am, at times, and we're helpful. So, instead of saying that you're not a turnip, when nobody called you that, please tell us what's bothering you, then we can see what we can do about it.

[foxcole]

The closest thing to a "quick-start guide" is the Writer Guide, which you will find in the links in my signature, below.

It's impossible to address every new user's needs in a way that best suits that user. Everyone has different backgrounds, different levels of understanding, different work requirements, different ways of viewing, seeing and interpreting the world around them, different ideas of what constitutes usability. No one learns a software application overnight. We just don't have the kind of adaptable technologies that would enable such perfect usability for every person.

The documentation, the Help file, and this forum will be your most helpful allies. No question is too small. And sometimes we do find alternative solutions that will do a better job of accomplishing what the requester needs to accomplish.

[Bekah]

CHET-NUN

Wow! great explanations and helpfulness (and a reminder to start my spring garden. Now where did I put those turnip seeds...LOL).

Have a great weekend.

I'll check back in next week, Lord willing.

Peace,
Bekah

[lapsed librarian]

Hi:

The hawkshare site was down when I checked, so I'm not 100% sure this is what you want, but I suspect it's either text frames or text boxes. There's a good tutorial here: http://openoffice.blogs.com/openoffice/ ... text_.html

It's on how to centre them, but the instructions are such you can pretty much figure out how to place the text anywhere you want.