Managing Styles

Overview

Open Office uses styles extensively. Without understanding how to use styles you will have a hard time learning Open Office. It may take longer to learn, but it makes it much easier to modify documents later. At least you need to know how to use Paragraph, Page, and Character Styles.

Paragraph Styles

The first icon in the style palette lists paragraph styles. The drop list at the bottom can be used to limit the styles displayed to those already used in the current document. Double-click on the name of a style in the list to apply it to the selected text. Right-click on the style name to modify the paragraph style, or right-click in the current paragraph to edit the current paragraph formatting only.

Character Styles

The second icon lists character styles, which are automatically applied to footnote anchors and footnote characters, for example. If you want to modify the size or position of footnote or endnote numbers in the text or notes, the style palette is the right place to do it. Then all notes in the document will be updated to match.

Frame Styles

If you want to use frames in your document to hold illustrations, tables, or for callouts, you can define frame styles to keep them all looking alike. Set the border, text wrap, position, etc., in the frame style, and apply the same style to frames with the same function that you insert later.

You can use a graphic in one corner of a frame, on one side, or as a textured background. The Frame style on the left was created by using the toolbar image as a background in the top left corner, setting a hairline white border on the left with 0.5” spacing to the contents, and a 1 pt border on the right with 0.06” spacing to the contents. You could use a graphic background for the whole frame area too, but the graphic would need to be the right size to suit the frame, which would need to be a fixed size.

Page Styles

Page styles are used to control text flow and page layout. Many documents require different page layouts for different sections: title pages, front matter, table of contents, preface, chapter title page, left page, right page, illustration page, index, and bibliography. Some layouts require no page numbers, while others need page numbers left, right, or centre. Some pages use two or more columns, while others need only one. The fourth icon in the style palette lists some common page styles, any of which you can modify and rename.

Page styles are linked: that is the style that follows a page break is defined as part of the style. Right pages are usually followed by left pages, and right pages are usually followed by left pages. To break that sequence, insert a manual page break, and select the page style you want, e.g. to force the first page style for a new chapter.

Page styles can also be applied by double-clicking on the style name in the style list. Since the style is linked to itself or another style, changing the style for one page will change the rest of the document. Don’t panic! This is supposed to happen because the page styles are linked. Just insert a manual page break, and decide which page style you wish to follow the current page.

List Styles

This option allows you to define styles for bulleted and numbered lists for outlines. Using styles ensures that documents are consistent and easy to modify. Pressing enter in a blank paragraph of a bulleted or numbered list, automatically turns off the list style and reverts to the default paragraph style.

A list style is not a new paragraph style with bullets, but a bullet style that can be applied to different paragraph styles. The illustration shows how the Numbering 1 style is used with a body text paragraph style. The paragraph style has a Before Text indent of 0.2" and the following paragraph has a First Line indent also of 0.2". The number is aligned right with a Spacing to Text distance of 0.35" and a Minimum space between the number and text of 0.05".

Fill Format Mode

Fill format mode is used to copy text formatting to other parts of your document. With the cursor inside the formatted text, click on the icon. Drag the format mode cursor (the paint bucket) over any text to apply that formatting. You can copy a character style, or bold, italic, Title Case, etc. Click on the icon again to turn off Fill Format Mode.

New Style From Selection

To create a new style based on the existing selection, click on the last icon at the top of the style palette, enter a name for the new style, and make any modifications you need. The kind of style created depends on the current selection. If text is selected it will be a character style, if a frame is selected it will be a frame style, etc.