I went to columns and selected the 2 side column and when I go to type my first half, the second side doesn’t let me type and I’m not sure why and I don’t know how to fix it. Please help and thank you.
If the columns are defined for the page style or for a section:
The text will flow into the second column as soon as the first column is filled on the current page. You may also expressly start to fill the next column by inserting a column break manually (‘Insert’ > ‘Manual Break…’ > ‘Column break’).
I did not understand the term “two pages at once”. My guess was you wanted to be able to work on both of two columns intermittently. Depending on the circumstances you may also use a table to display independent parts of text in columns. …
Thank you but I’m kinda not understanding, I want to make a book and I want to type one on side and then a completely different thing on the other side. So when I put them together it will make a book, if that makes sense. I know there is a newspaper format but I don’t want the current words to wrap around that format. I want to type my paragraphs on one side. The type something else on the other side. If that makes sense at all
It sounds like you need a combination of the two answers. However, instead of a column break, you seem to want a page break, so typing after that will show up on the second page, which will be printed on the back side of the page if printed duplex.
Based upon you comment, you are looking to print on both sides of a page. So, after reading page 1, page 2 is on the backside of the paper. If this is the case, this is a printer capability. It is referred to as ‘Duplex’ printing and will then have a setting in the printer properties. Many printers only print ‘Simplex’ - one side (you can print Odd # pages first then flip the paper and print the Even # pages but care is necessary). In Writer even if printing in ‘Duplex’, you only see one page at a time. When printed, the first then the second page of your document will go on the front & back of one piece of paper.
The other possible answer to your question is the ‘View’. There are three views available - Single-page, Multi-page & Book. This selection is available from the Status Bar (bottom of window or turn on with menu View->Status Bar). They are the Page(s) icons just to the left of the Zoom level.
Click on one to select the view you want.
All columns in Writer are newspaper columns, where text flows from one column to the next. If you want the columns to be independent, I believe it was called “parallel columns” in WordPerfect, my, that was long ago, you should probably use a table.
You can also work with a single column on a smaller size page and then print two pages on one sheet.