[Solved] How to create new paragraph styles

[WardXmodem]

I'm running Apache 4.1.10, and struggling constantly with formatting.
The previous replies in this thread gave me what I need, but it doesn't work for me:

When I define a style, modify it to say indents and spacing / indent / Before text [0.75]
that is ignored. I've even made it 2" -- when I double click my style the indent goes back to 0 IN THE FILE, but stays 0.75 in the style modifier.

Thanks for any help!!!

VV

Split from ancient thread. floris v

[Zizi64]

Please upload your ODF type sample file here.

[RoryOF]

This document may be informative:
Writer for students (several languages)

Nothing beats reading some instructions!

[floris v]

I'm running Apache 4.1.10, and struggling constantly with formatting.
The previous replies in this thread gave me what I need, but it doesn't work for me:

When I define a style, modify it to say indents and spacing / indent / Before text [0.75]
that is ignored. I've even made it 2" -- when I double click my style the indent goes back to 0 IN THE FILE, but stays 0.75 in the style modifier.

Thanks for any help!!!

VV

If you applied direct formatting (setting indents etc with the toolbar buttons), that will override the effect of the paragraph style definition.

[Villeroy]

Format > Default Formatting (Ctrl+M) removes all direct formatting from selected text. What remains is the underlying style.

[WardXmodem]

If you applied direct formatting (setting indents etc with the toolbar buttons), that will override the effect of the paragraph style definition.

Thanks, but no, I don't use the toolbar buttons. Indent, for ex. indents a half inch. WAAY too much when doing what I do.

[Bill]

The default indent is and always has been zero, not a half inch. If you want a quick answer instead of guesses, then upload a sample document for analysis.

[WardXmodem]

The default indent is and always has been zero, not a half inch. If you want a quick answer instead of guesses, then upload a sample document for analysis.

please reply after reading the thread, not out of context.

If I read the whole thread and your reply, you are saying "the indent button on the toolbar is and always has been zero". yah.

[WardXmodem]

Please upload your ODF type sample file here.

Thank you for replying.
Here it is.

WX Sample.odt

(26.75 KiB) Downloaded 256 times

My requirement is to have shortcut keys to define the 4 "things" I use - plain, un-indented numbered, indented bullet, and double indented bullet. Yes, I know how to define my own shortcut keys, and to use F12, ^M, etc

Here are my comments that are within that file in addition to the normal content:

These are the only formats I need:
I make my own headers by brute force, just centered, bold, and some font size. I don't want an index or table of contents, nor to say define header 1 as the
The majority of the document is numbered steps, with 2 levels of bulleted indent under them.

I admit I don't clearly understand “styles” vs “formats”. It would seem I have ONE style – 12 point, Times New Roman. The rest of the requirements relate to indents, numbering, and bullets, which “styles” don't have fields to set, only “lists”.

[floris v]

First a bit of history, that will explain more than anything else. In the old days of word processing, when printers were very limited, widely used software like WordPerfect 5 for MS Dos didn't even feature italics, because most printers at that time couldn't print in italics. Fonts were limited to what the printer supported, font size was limited to Normal, Large, Very large, stuff like that. You had to remember or write down how you formatted headings - bold or underlined, indented, whatever - and apply each bit of formatting for each and every heading in your document. Then somebody invented styles - basically a kind of macro that would apply all formatting bits defined in it in one go to the selected text.

Nowadays, a style is a collection of formatting details that you want to use more than once in a document to help maintain a consistent formatting. It can include any formatting, not just font face and size. If you want to indent quotations, you can have a style for quotations, with your preferred indentation. If you want to have section titles centered, you can define the section style to have its text centered. If you want your Hints for ... headings centered, you can have a Hints paragraph style with just centered text turned on.

In your document, you have to remember that you use size 20, boldface and centered text for your main heading Kit 10C, 8x16 bi-color Matrix Blinkie G3 wherever you want the same formatting for a heading again. Instead, you can use the Heading 1 paragraph style, that you modify according to your wishes. You can format the paragraph heading Soldering hints as a Heading 2 paragraph, then whenever you apply that style, it will automatically center the text and set it to bold. Etc.

If you want to have a table of contents, you can build it from the paragraphs formatted with Heading 1, 2, ... styles.

In short: read up on styles, they're there to help you.

Added edited document.

[RoryOF]

[
I admit I don't clearly understand “styles” vs “formats”. It would seem I have ONE style – 12 point, Times New Roman. The rest of the requirements relate to indents, numbering, and bullets, which “styles” don't have fields to set, only “lists”.

It is simply a matter of nomenclature: a Style is a collection - a list, if you like - of options such as font, size, type style (bold, italic etc); also of characteristics of a paragraph such as justified or non-justified, line spacing, first line indent etc; all these options amalgamated into a named Style apply their predefined format to a selection of text. Because a Style is defined only once, the formatting it applies is consistent, whereas, if one tries to directly format a document, one can often overlook one or more characteristics of the formatting one desires.

A useful overview of using Styles is given in the documents in this thread
[Example] Document structure and numbering

[John_Ha]

You will find much useful information in the Writer FAQ, the Writer Tutorials, the up to date AOO Writer for Students and the Writer User Guide. May I suggest you bookmark the pages.

Press F1 to access the Help screen and search for your problem

The chapter headings in the manual, where you want chapters 6 and 7, are:

1 - Introducing Writer
2 - Setting up Writer
3 - Working with Text
4 - Formatting Pages
5 - Printing, Exporting, Faxing and E-Mailing
6 - Introduction to Styles
7 - Working with Styles
8 - Working with Graphics
9 - Working with Tables
10 - Working with Templates
11 - Using Mail Merge
12 - Tables of Contents, Indexes and Bibliographies
13 - Working with Master Documents
14 - Working with Fields
15 - Using Forms in Writer
16 - Customizing Writer – Keyboard shortcuts.

When a pop-up window opens, click the Help button for extensive help on that function - it is often more comprehensive than the manual.

[WardXmodem]

What I was missing -- and mentioned - was the relation between styles and formatting = lists.

I finally poured through the various tabs in the "styles" modification, and came across the "numbering style" entry.

I created the 3 new "outline" list formats I needed: numbered steps, indented bullet, and double-indented bullet.

I created 3 styles, and set each one's numbering styles to one of the list formats I'd created.

I then assigned function keys 2,3,4 to be these 3 styles.

I "emptied" this document, so it had only the styles, and saved as a template.

Now I can load the template, save as a .odt, and have my styles handy.

Thanks for all the attempts to help me -- except the ones that said to read LOTS of stuff.

Be well.