There’s really no direct formatting involved in most of LibreOffice’s bullets and numbers formatting because it affects all such lists regardless of whether they use “styles” or not.
So, there’s no way to avoid it.
This statement is utterly wrong.
OK, teach it to me. How can I create custom styles to have a “professional” workflow where I can create better (as in semantic) exam documents.
And here a bonus question. What about questions with listed premises like this:
Note that this is not a direct formatting, but a special shortcut for the “unnumbered entry” function.
1 Like
Yes, I have.
The lists in it are based exclusively on the list template Level 1-2, which was also newly created.
You can check this in the Outline &List tab.
Edit:
You only need 2 paragraph styles because the bold font is used once.
You can’t have a level-2 item where the first has a full number (levels 1+2) and the next ones only the number for the current level (level 2 only). Either use full numbers for every item or add an empty level-1 item (the “3.” number will appear as a separate paragraph).
Presently, Writer does not support “inline paragraphs”, i.e. paragraph for which the “next-line” action is suppressed at end of paragraph. Consequently, you can layout several list items in the same line.
There could be a substitute with Numbering range fields but you’ll need as many numbers ranges as questions, which is not user-friendly.
So you created 2 custom styles one is named as “Level 1” and the other is “Level 2”. Then you edited the “Level 1” in its Outline & List tab to include both “Level 1” and “Level 2”. Is that correct? And if so, did you create “Level 1” and “Level 2” styles from the preset style that is simply called “List”?
First create a testbench using Numbering 1 and Numbering 1 Cont. styles (find them in the List Styles category under Paragraph Styles). Example:
Then edit your Numbering 1 style to apply numbering via this dialog:
You may have to modify the formatting values of the Numbering 123 List style according to your liking. This will affect all list styles using Numbering 123:
Finally, modify your Numbering 1 Cont. style to match the ident of Numbering 1:
To achieve your final objective, set Numbering 1 Cont. to a negative First Line Indent and proportionally expand your Before Text indent:
You’ll be able to type your answer letters and then hit tab. As you see above, the rest of the text is properly and professionally aligned.
1 Like
So I have to type the answer letters manually then?
Yes, otherwise you’ll have to create a 2nd level list. I personally tried that and found it too difficult to handle, especially if you are trying to shoehorn multiple choices in the same line. It’s better to have some flexibility in the answers region.
Please @Stokpan, stop giving buggy recipes. Learn how to master list styles. The more @umitseyhan asks for help, the more you confuse him.
The case is quite simple: there is a question at level 1 and possible answers at level 2. The numbering can be achived with a single list style. Let’s use Numbering 1. Level 1 will be numbered numerically, level 2 alphabetically. Alignment and indent will be set as necessary in those levels.
If both questions and answers look the same (same font size and weight), we can use a single paragraph style, e.g. Numbering 1. If questions and answers have a different aspect, we can use Numbering 1 Start to give a distinctive look to the question.
See example document AskLOMultiFormatList.odt (38.9 KB)
The issu here is there needs to be 3 listings: First is the question number (3.), second is the premise listing (I. II. III.) which needs to start at the same line question number starts, and lastly the answers (A B C D E) which needs to be listed horizontally and not vertically.
Yes I know. We are clearly coming from similar backgrounds.
I have already answered to this objection here. This can’t be done with the list feature.
If OP is ready to accept a tedious manual process based on “number range” fields and partly cross-references, I can explain the complicated workaround. It is guaranteed consistent numbering but it is not user-friendly.
The closest I could achieve is shown in AskLOInlineNumbering.odt (13.5 KB).
Thank you for the workaround, but seems like I will have to put direct formatting here and there for different question types no matter what I do. Automation works best for regular texts and not for exam documents.
Not really direct formatting but, from user’s point of view, it has the same effect: manual configuration in each question. The manual non-automatable part is: you must create one number range per question (conditions) and another one for answers to the question.
Number range for conditions can be eliminated if question number is on a line by itself or if all conditions also bear the question number. Then conditions car be numbered with the list feature at level 2.
Learn how to use styles. Your sample file is plagued with direct formatting which is incompatible with “smart” solutions.
The first thing to understand is that styles denote various significances.
Your document contains questions and answers. These are two different “significances”. Therefore they should be distinguished by styles; There are two main ways to do it (others are possible):
A single homogeneous list
This is a combination of a paragraph style and a list style. You associate the list style to the paragraph style in the Outline & List tab.
The paragraph style will define the typographical attributes of the items. The list style defines numbering (e.g. number at level 1, letter at level 2), indentation and alignment of left edge of item text. The indent parameter id the one you’re looking for.
Since you want to emphasize the question with regard to answers, I don’t recommend this solution because the same paragraph style is applied to all levels. Don’t apply direct formatting to embolden the question as direct formatting always leads to later problems.
A single list style associated to several paragraph styles
A list is semantically defined by a list style. Associating the same list style to several paragraph styles makes them member of the same logical list. Having several paragraph styles allows to vary item formatting.
BUT, you can’t assign a list level to your paragraph styles. Consequently, you’ll have to promote manually your items to the required level, hitting Tab at the very beginning of the item until you reach your level. You can demote an item by hitting Shift+Tab also at the very beginning of the item.
As always, the left indent and first line position of the item is controlled by the list style, not the paragraph style.
What about Format>Bullets & Numbering ?
This is a form of direct formatting mainly offered as a compatibility feature with M$ Word. Don’t use it. Because it is direct formatting, which should be enough to discard it. Because it had to be twisted in a very contorted way which can make updates to your document very difficult. Since Word has no notion of styles, particularly list styles, the concept of list is not based on a rigorous definition making detection of list membership extremely difficult and this leads to situation where numbering gets wild.
Prefer list styles, even if understand and mastering the feature is hard. But after that, applying a list styles implies membership to a list without ambiguity (you can then have interleaved lists without problems).
“What about Format>Bullets & Numbering ? This is a form of direct formatting mainly offered as a compatibility feature with M$ Word.”
Not quite. Bullets and numbering defines the style for all specific uses of bullet and numbering styles. It’s essential to understand and use it if you wish to customize your list styles.
Wrong. Format>Bullets & Numbering is an awful tweak to circumvent beginners’ difficulty in understanding list styles (and I admit it is very difficult to master them). Having a “one-size-fits-all” direct numbering feature results in a fundamental difficulty in identifying where a different list (semantically-wise) starts or ends so that you can apply a different numbering. This also explains why modifying Format>Bullets & Numbering has no global effect on your lists. It may have a local effect if your cursor is adequately positioned. All these difficulties are lifted when you use list styles since application of such a list style clearly identifies the nature of the list. Modifying the list style will then have the expected global effect as with all other styles.
But, once again, this may be the style category hardest to master.
As always, for your peace of mind and ease of changing your layout/formatting, work with styles and not direct formatting.
EDIT
Looking at your corrected sample document, you didn’t use Format>Bullets & Numbering; you created a custom list style Level 1-2. This is the “professional” way of doing it. However, DON’T use Format>Bullets & Numbering to modify it. You’ll add a direct formatting layer over the existing style layers. Mixing DF and styling is the beginning of formatting hell.
1 Like