Can you drop the period in Chapter numbering?

[Section8uk]

I am trying to drop the . from the chapter numbering on my Appendices and format my book like

CHAPTER 1:  Heading
    1.1    Subheading
         1.1.1    Subsubheading
         1.1.2    Subsubheading

CHAPTER 2:  Heading
    2.1    Subheading
         2.1.1    Subsubheading
         2.1.2    Subsubheading
...

APPENDIX A:  Heading
    A1    Subheading
         A1.1     Subsubheading
         A1.2     Subsubheading

APPENDIX B:  Heading
    B1    Subheading
         B1.1     Subsubheading
         B1.2     Subsubheading
...

I can’t even find an option to tell LO to use a period. What if I wanted to use a hyphen as the separator? I have looked pretty much everywhere and read through every chapter numbering tutorial I can find to no avail. Can anyone please tell me if this is even possible.

[Regina]

There is no way to change or drop the separator.

But you can get a numbering, which looks as you want using some tricks. The problem is, that you need to know how to get a chapter numbering hierarchy manually. Are you familiar with that?

I suggest not to use chapter numbering for the appendix, but define your own paragraph heading styles for the appendix. You need an own numbering style in addition. In the tab Outline & Numbering you set the outline level of the heading style and select this own numbering style. Faking it with level 5,6 7 of chapter numbering does not work well in indexes and Navigator.

But because you want no dot as separator you would need for each appendix chapter its own numbering style. In this numbering style you would use the character A, (for next chapter B, then next chapter C) in the ‘before’ field of level 2 and 3. And you would need for each appendix chapter on own set of paragraph heading styles because the numbering style would be specific to the chapter.

Is it worth such an effort? I would say ‘no’. Go with the dot and you need only one numbering style for the whole appendix and only three heading styles.

Note, if you work with numbered headings outside the predefined chapter numbering, then

• currently the paragraph indents are not made in the position tab of the numbering style, but in the paragraph styles.
• to change the numbering to another level you have to manually change the numbering level in the numbering toolbar in addition to applying the correct heading style.

[Section8uk]

I am familiar enough with “Tools->Chapter Numbering” in regards to linking it to a Paragraph Style so it numbers the chapters automatically. I have level 1,2,3 as my chapter headings and 5,6,7 as my appendix headings. That’s about as far as I’ve needed to go with numbering things. Can you point me in the direction of an explanation of what you suggested?

[ajlittoz]

Tools>Chapter Numbering gives you access to all settings for chapter numbering.

The default setting uses the dot only inside the number, i.e. there is no final character. You already have 2.1.2 without the final dot.

To get CHAPTER 1:, enter "CHAPTER " and “:” respectively in the Separator Before and After. You may eventually need to customise Numbering followed by in the Position tab to get the correct distance between the number and the title.

You can’t however change the intermediate dot in the numbering because it is internally generated by Writer and you can’t change it for a hyphen to get 2-1-2.

Last, chapter numbering defines a single sequence counter. You can’t tell it to change from numeric to alphabetic for the appendices. This change in numbering is possible but the trick is not immediate for a newbie.

Basically, you must define a separate sequence counter with a list style and duplicate the Heading n family to associate the new family with the sequence counter. The various paragraph styles of the new heading family must be given the correct Outline level in their Outline & Numbering tab.

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[Section8uk]

Thanks for your reply. I have already set up the Chapter Numbering levels 1,2,3 to my chapter heading paragraph styles with CHAPTER prefix and : suffix and levels 5,6,7 to my appendix heading paragraph styles. I just wanted to drop the . from the A.1 style appendix sub-headers.

[ajlittoz]

I was not attentive enough when reading your example. I didn’t notice the B1. I’d like to point out a discrepancy: you have “Appendix B”, then immediately “B1 Subheading”, after that “B1.1”, etc. According o common usage, this tends to make the reader think that the appendix is “B1” and that there one less level then you wrote. For me, it is better to have “B.1.1” to show there are 3 levels.