Alright, after 3 hours of researching, debugging, keyboard-smashing, and learning, I’ve finally figured out something that works. Because the solution I found is (seemingly) undocumented in a unified, coherent manner, I figured I would explain the process I used for any future struggling LibreOffice users:
First off, my utlimate goal was to create multiple pages of single-sided ~3x5 flashcards in Writer, that could easily be printed off and cut up into a convenient stack. I wanted to have bits of text aligned in the top left, bottom left, and bottom right corners, as well as a block of text in the center left aligned. Because of the limitations of headers, as well as Writer’s lack of vertical alignment settings and polymorphism, I turned to the address label functionality of the LO Suite.
To begin, I opened up a new Calc spreadsheet, and entered in all of my information into columns. Headings went above the columns in the first row (things like “citation”, “card number”), and the following rows each represented the information on one notecard.
Upon saving the completed spreadsheet, I then had to create a new database file (with LO Base): in the Database Wizard, I chose the “connect to an existing database” option, then directed the wizard to my spreadsheet file.
As soon as the database was created and registered with LibreOffice (should be done automatically by the wizard), I went to File → New → Labels. On the Labels tab, I chose the newly created database and spreadsheet, then loaded in all of the required data using the “database field” dropdown and button. I chose the desired paper size in the “brand” dropdown and the desired notecard size in the “Type” dropdown. (advanced options for this are available in the “format” tab.) A KEY STEP AT THIS POINT is to go to the “options” tab and select the “synchronize contents” checkbox. This allows you to make advanced formatting changes in the following steps that will be copied to every notecard.
Hitting “New Document” will take you to a Writer file. (Three seperate LO programs have been used so far. Convuluted, right?) Gray fields with your data names should be repreated in notecard frames copied across a single page. Here, you can use the generated frames to pad and position the fields as you wish. If you, like me, wish to have text aligned at the bottom, create a new frame anchored “TO PARAGRAPH” in terms of the top-left hand existing notecard. (This means create the frame while the cursor is within the top-left hand notecard.) You can then move the new frame around as you wish and copy/paste the various labels into and out of it. If there is ever a point where the formatting of the notecards was not synchronized, simply hitting “synchronize labels” in the seperate window that appears upon creating the labels should do the trick.
Finally, when everything else is complete, go to the Writer window and hit Tools → Mail Merge Wizard. Most of this stuff is already configured correctly (at least, it was for me), so just carefully nit “next” without changing anything unless you’re sure it needs to be changed for your project. At some point it will give you an option to preview your notecards; make sure they look good before finalizing and generating them all!
You will have an option at the end to save the final document (while still in the wizard). Do this, and save it in a location that you can easily find, then hit finish!
Once everything is finalized and saved, for some reason Writer will open up two seperate documents - both of which will look oddly unfinished and ugly. It’s safe to close out of these half-finished documents, as the completed document is already saved in the location you chose in the previous step. Open up that bad boy and print off the completed masterpiece!
Whew. All that being said, I can somewhat respect this convoluted process. It allows for extreme modularity in your notecards, and because the source data is saved in Calc and Base you can use the spreadsheet and database organization tools to sort your notecards in almost any way imaginable! Keep in mind though, if you’re like me and have a large project with a looming due date, not to spend too much time on formatting and sorting. You’ll keep yourself up unreasonably late doing pointless tasks. Go for the simplest solution possible, and run with it.
I hope I’ve been somewhat of a help with this tutorial, and that I’ll have saved some others from my tedious struggle! Feel free to reply, or send me a message (if that’s possible on this website) if you have any questions or corrections!
