Create style from selection doesn't care about custom formatting

[eobet1]

People in here harp on about styles styles styles, so when I try to be a good user then and select a chunk of text and go to the menu which says “create style from selection”, I’d expect the program to read all of my custom formatting, create a style from that and then replace my selection with that style.

But does any of that happen? F NO.

That’s not even a UX papercut, but what I’d call a UX slap in the face.

[Lupp]

???
I’m using Calc now for decades, and defined styles (for cell, page, drawing) often using “New Style from Selection”. It always worked as expected.
The only flaw is that you can choose the tool while more than a single cell / page / drawing (to be used as the template for the new style) is selected, and you get no warning that there aren’t “CellRange styles” or “Page Group styles” or …
What a “chunk of text” should be in a spreadsheet is your secret.

[eobet1]

Damn, sorry. This should have been posted to writer, not calc. Changed the tag now.

Didn’t pay attention in the heat of the moment, I was too upset.

[EarnestAl]

@eobet1

“create style from selection”

This is a poor way to create styles as you are likely to include unintended attributes and unexpectedly cut inheritance. Think of it as an intermediate method between direct formatting and a systematic use of styles.

It is best to start by knowing how styles inherit. Make sure you have Hierarchical set for viewing the styles while you are setting them up for a document or template.

• Default Paragraph Style is the ultimate ancestor of all paragraph styles; all paragraph styles inherit from it. It is not used in documents. The attributes explicitly defined in the General tab of the child style will not change if the same attribute is changed in its parent style(s).
• Heading paragraph style inherits from Default Paragraph style but it makes some changes. These are listed in the General tab. If you change Font or Spacing in Default Paragraph Style it will not affect Heading. All Heading n styles inherit from Heading
• Body Text is the default style for the main body of the document. It is listed as the Next style in the General tab of the Heading styles. It has only a couple of attributes that are not inherited from Default Paragraph Style.
  This means that if you need to make a global font change, say to Libertine 9 pt, you would change it in Default Paragraph Style not in Body Text. All the other styles*, such as Frame Contents, Footnote, etc. will change the font face, although Footnote would not change its size as it size is shown in the General tab (inheritance for size is cut from its parent). There is an exception for Font size, if it is set as a percentage, e.g. 80% then inheritance is retained.
  *Except Heading and Preformatted text

There is also an order of precedence, higher numbers overrule lower numbers

1. Fonts set in Tools > Options > LibreOffice Writer > Basic Fonts (Western)
2. Paragraph styles
3. Character styles
4. Direct formatting

To get a better understanding of how use styles to make formatting easier,

• The introduction to Designing with LibreOffice has a good explanation, download from English documentation II | LibreOffice Documentation - LibreOffice User Guides
• The Writer Guide has a chapter on Styles, download from English documentation | LibreOffice Documentation - LibreOffice User Guides

[mm-john]

@eobet1

“create style style from selection”

@EarnestAl

This is a poor way to create styles

And yet View - Toolbars - Customize - New Style altho called “New Style” on the left, when it’s shown as an available command to add, becomes “New Style From Selection” apparently unconditionally when actually added to the right in a particular menu.

IE there is no way through the menus to add a new style NOT from current selection. You are FORCED to use “from current selection.”

The only alternative is to open the styles side bar on the right. right click (context menu) on an existing style, and click New Style from there.

So, LibreOffice forces you to do it the “poor” (I agree, for the reasons user EarnestAl stated) way unless you go through a bunch of extra clicks.

This current arrangement seems non-ideal.

Or am I missing something?

(In my view here right now, LibreOffice.org forum is not putting blank lines between my paragraphs…)

[EarnestAl]

@mm-john

there is no way through the menus to add a new style NOT from current selection

Using my explanation of inheritance, everything inherits from Default Paragraph style so you could select an unmodified example to create a New Style from Selection.
.
When you edit that new style (Styles > Edit Style), every attribute that you set will cut inheritance for that attribute so make sure that Default Paragraph style is as you want it initially.
.
If you want an additional new style for, say Table Contents, then select an unmodified example of Table Contents and do New Style from Selection then edit just the attributes that you want to change, nothing else.

From the menu, Styles > Manage Styles opens the sidebar for Styles anyway.

BTW This site uses Markdown, you can use <br> to create a break, or if you are lazy, you can just enter a full stop. This from the pinned page should help, This is the guide - How to use the Ask site? - #6 by erAck