Convert straight quotes to curly quotes problem

[SarahB1863]

Hi all,

I have a document that, because it’s pasted together from several other documents, has some sections with straight quotes and some with curly quotes.

I’d like to convert the document to all curly quotes, and I found a way thanks to this forum to do that: create a ‘replace quotes’ option in the Autocorrect Options and then choose Apply.

And that works to change the quotes, BUT it also removes ALL the formatting in the document. All my underlines, italics, bolds, etc., disappear.

Does anybody know what I’m doing wrong? Thanks for your help!

Sarah B.

[ajlittoz]

I can’t tell what you’re doing wrong. It appears that you are direct formatting your document, i.e. use Ctrl+B or Ctrl+I commands to decorate it. This is the workflow imposed by M$ Word because it has no other means of doing it.

Writer has a much more elaborate formatting model with its style system. You may be accustomed to paragraph styles because nearly every document processing application offers them to define the “geometry” and other properties of paragraphs. Writer also has character styles to format words of character sequences differently from the paragraph context set by the paragraph style.

Formatting created by styles is stable. It is not erased by actions triggered by macros or commands. It provides a much more reliable formatting and layout. In addition, it is extraordinary powerful and versatile, allowing possibilities well beyond what you can achieve with direct formatting

There are also page, frame and list styles.

I recommend you read the Writer Guide for an introduction to “styling”. Proper usage of styles requires that you drop your routine inherited from Word and accept the change of mind resulting from the different abstract model.

[mikekaganski]

When you create the autocorrect rule, make sure that Text only checkbox is checked. Otherwise, when you apply the rule, the text gets formatted with the formatting of the original selection that you used to create the rule, which could include the paragraph formatting.