Is there a consistent way to set up defaults which will always be used?

I am using LO Draw 6.2.4.2. I have always had problems setting up defaults which are used consistently. There are multiple methods to be found online, on the LIbreoffice site and others, of defining default line colours, area fills and colours, text setting and so on. I use Draw often, and find the standard default line and area colours of Dark Blue to be a confounded nuisance, so I want to use (in my case) black lines, no area color as default. I can set up a template for this, but following the numerous explanations how to set this as default always fails - the next time I open Draw, I’m back to blue lines and areas.
It is extremely annoying to have to set this up every time I use Draw, to the extent that I am looking for an alternative, because LIbreoffice is so annoying in this respect - please provide an easy, reliable way to set up a default template.

The method to define a default template with your default settings is the same across all LibO components.

  1. On an empty document, open the style editor with F11
  2. Right click on the style called “Default” and select “modify,” changing all the settings you need before clicking Ok
  3. Now go to File → Templates → Save as Template, check the option Set as default template, provide a name for the template and click on Save

That’s it. The next document will use the newly define default template.

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I just want to add the following note: When the Save As Template dialog is displayed, you must click on a Template Category other than None before you can save it. (Maybe things may have changed since this answer was posted.)

Thanks for the reply, but I think I am missing something. One of the things I frequently want for example) is a shape (from the list) with black line edge and no fill. So far I have found two ways to do this: I can either modify the objects properties from a right click, or from the ‘Properties’ editor, or I can draw the object, then click on the appropriate item in the ‘Styles’ editor. Having to modify every item using the first method is too slow for intensive work. The second method is also too slow, and apparently (as far as I can see) is only good for that session.

I also found i could change the area fill from the ‘Format / Area’ menu item, and the line from the ‘Format / Line’ menu. This worked fine - but only for that session. There does not seem any way to save this setting as a default. It does seem logical to set default colors, etc for shapes from this menu, but no way to keep it. As well as this method, I can also make the settings for a specific item from the ‘Properties’ menu, but then that only applies to the selected object.

So it seems there are at least two methods to set session-specific settings, but no way to generate a ‘universal default’ other than messing with the ‘Styles’ Editor, which I consider very clumsy and slow and does not seem to deal with all possibilities. I really do not want to have to go through all this trouble every time I start a drawing or document - I want to use LO for a specific task, which requires specific drawing settings - but I cannot do this, apparently. There are many comments online on the lines of ‘who the hell wants shapes with blue lines or fills?’ - this seems a fair question, and I have never seen any justification for this. The concept of a default template is fine, and of course one could have different templates for different types of work, but one cannot set all lthe defaults needed. My suggestion would be to allow full editing and saving of the default template, because at the moment it only appears to be possible to set ‘some’ of the settings, and is therefore confusing and unclear - or is that too simple?. This odd behaviour ruins what is otherwise a very good tool, so I think I will need to look elsewhere.

If you want all your objects to have a particular line/background/whatever, just follow my original answer: modify the style called “Default” to your liking and save that document as your default template. All new objects on all new documents will use those settings. I’ve been doing this for many, many years so I know it works. Of course, old documents will not be affected because they use a different template, only the new documents will work without problems. If your problem is to set the defaults on old documents, just modify the corresponding styles. You can also try to use the DocumentTemplateChanger extension to update the styles of old documents to the new template.

Thanks again for your answer. I followed your advice, but still cannot get what I want. I can open an object (a rectangle say), and it has a blue fill and blue lines. I agree I can cahnge this to no fill and black line simply by selecting the appropriate style, and it will stay like that - but only that object. I cannot get wanted configuration into the template. I can modify things, save the template, set it as default, but next time it reverts to the original settings. This always happens, whether I modify the ‘Default’ template or one of my own.
I appreciate the help, but now I have given up, and will stop using Libre Office. It seems very confusing to have multiple methods of setting ‘defaults’ - far better to have one modifiable template.
Sorry about this, but that has been my experience, and whilst I appreciate your help, I no longer have time to play about with the tools I am trying to use. Perhaps if LO sorts out these confusing points, I will use LO again sometime.

Just to add credence . . . This does not work under Windows 10. It does work under Ubuntu / linux. It would be nice if we got a fix for Windoze.

It works for me on Windows 10!


Version: 7.3.0.3 (x64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: 0f246aa12d0eee4a0f7adcefbf7c878fc2238db3
CPU threads: 8; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 19044; UI render: Skia/Raster; VCL: win
Locale: de-DE (de_DE); UI: de-DE
Calc: CL