Automatic Chapter Numbering Stopped

[JEN001]

I’ve got a book typed in Libre Office that had auto Chapter Numbering all sorted, but now when I try and insert a new chapter in the middle of a previous one it’s always number 1 and the sequential order isn’t renumbering.

Weirdly, the template with all the original paragraph formatting that I created works fine.

Attached is a lipsum version of both. Has anyone’s come across this sort of thing and can shed light?

Thanks.

Temaplate without chapter numbering issues.odt (20.7 KB)
test with chapter numbering issues 1.odt (15.1 KB)

[ajlittoz]

Your file “with issues” has been created under Word, or has been in contact with, or has been edited at some time in Word. Somebody (you?) added direct formatted over your “new” intermediate A_Chapter: it is tentatively numbered using list style WWNum1 (one of the signatures betraying an import fromM$ Word). This direct formatting takes precedence over the automatic *Tools>Heading Numbering, attaching the paragraph to a different list (the one defined by WWNum1, which is totally separate from the heading numbering list).

When I remove this DF (tricky because Ctrl+M has no effect on DF list styles), everything comes back to normal.

You also have a second problem with your TOC. A recent LO release tried to be more compatible with M$ Word (and this is faulty IMHO) by adding “fixes” for bad practice by beginners regarding abuse of empty paragraphs for vertical spacing

One of these fixes is removal of empty headings (on the ground that it may be a vertical spacing artefact). Though you have a number, making semantically the heading not really empty), it will not be collected in the TOC. In order to display “Chapter x” in the TOC, make sure you have at least a manual space in the heading. Everything automatically added does not count as heading “content”.

PS: you also have a WWNum2 but I didn’t take time to track where it is applied. So there is probably a second heading suffering the same problem.

[JEN001]

Many thanks. Ah, yes, the dreaded DF. It sounds like removing it from a list means getting under the hood of LO. In which case I’d no doubt make things worse! But if it is do-able for a non-coder then it would be good to know.

In the mean time, if anyone else comes across this issue, since I can’t reverse engineer it, from the Sidebar Settings > List Style, I’ve manually assigned the same list style to each chapter heading in the document (thankfully only heading level 1 in my case).

Then, when inserting a new chapter halfway through a previous one, I apply both the chapter paragraph style and the chosen list style. The auto updating works then.

It’s clunky but at least it makes the chapter auto updating work. Thanks again.

[ajlittoz]

Noooooo!!! By applying (manually) a list style, you create direct formatting again. The right procedure to remove DF list style is (optionally) to apply No List list style (with the cursor in the offending paragraph). Then apply a non-numbered paragraph style; Body Text or Ctrl+0 (digit zero) is handy for that. Finally re-apply your auto-numbered paragraph style.

[JEN001]

Got it. Many thanks.