Grey [ and ] characters in my document - how to remove (bookmarks)

[amadhatter]

This isn’t a question, more of an answer. I noticed I had some extra characters in my documents. They were [ and ] and they were greyed out. Also, they could not be selected so I could not cut and remove them. I read an article online which didn’t give the answer but I found out they were Bookmarks. How they got there I do not know as I never use Bookmarks. To remove them I simply clicked on Insert/Bookmark and deleted the Bookmarks in the document. It was driving me crazy, so I hope this helps someone else out.

[mikekaganski]

v. 7.0 release notes:

Bookmarks can now be displayed in-line in the text, controlled by Standard Toolbar ▸ Toggle Formatting Marks and Tools ▸ Options... ▸ LibreOffice Writer ▸ Formatting Aids ▸ Bookmarks tdf#45589

[LeroyG]

@amadhatter

How they got there I do not know

You pasted them with the text you copied (possibly) from internet.

Related answers:

Writer adds some hidden brackets signs (bookmarks)

It looks as if you have inserted bookmarks around your closing text. If you click Insert > Bookmark… a dialogue box will open showing the bookmarks already in your letter. If you don’t want the bookmarks select them and delete them in the dialogue box. This will delete only the bookmark, not the text. If you do want the bookmarks but don’t want to see the non-printing field markers you can click View > Field shadings to hide them, or press Ctrl+F8 Cheers, Al

Copied text remains in square brackets after pasting [ie. becomes a bookmark]

I can repeat the effect by Edit > Paste Special > Paste Special (Ctrl+Shift+V) and selecting Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE link). If I then Edit > Links to External Files > Break Link I get the effect I see in your sample where the pasted text is not a field but the bookmark remains. The bookmark in your sample shows it was pasted as a DDE link. You have either a corrupted user profile or one of your paste shortcuts is compromised in some way, possibly a sticky Shift key, customised paste shortcut…

What are the blue brackets? (bookmarks)

Bookmarks can be displayed in line with text, see release notes for version 7. [Edit changed bookmark link to #Writer] Settings in Tools > Options > LibreOffice Writer > Formatting Aids > Bookmarks. Cheers, Al