How to change "Separated by" in Writer Master Document

[ElSid]

I’m playing with the master document feature and have understood most of the items in the Writer Guide. The one issue that is alluding me is how to change the “separated by” that one selects when creating a new master per
WG60-WriterGuideLO.pdf pg. 363 Figure 362.

Question: on an existing master document, how do you change the master page break from Style: Title to Style: Subtitle without having to recreate the master document?

Update: Attached a picture in a comment below for creating a NEW master document and setting the break page Style dropdown menu. I want to change this parameter in an existing Master Document utilizing LO 6.4.1.2

[ajlittoz]

I don’t see exactly what you’re trying to do. Your question mixes Master/Subs with templates.

The procedure described in p. 363 is a one-shot process in case you didn’t create a master and its subordinate documents from the start. Once you have the master and the subs, you never re-split the original document which you might as well delete.

Also, if your original document was not based on a template, it is quite difficult (though always possible) to link it afterwards to some template.

Please edit your question to describe your final goal or use comments to start a discussion. Don’t use an aswer; it is reserved for solutions.

[ajlittoz]

I don’t see exactly what changed in your question. Can you clarify?

[ElSid]

Question and update in the main question were re-clarified

Question: on an existing master document, how do you change the master page break from Style: Title to Style: Subtitle without having to recreate the master document?

[ajlittoz]

I thought my answer was clear: you can’t.

The process is one-shot: ordinary document => master + subdocs. Since a master is not an ordinary document, it can’t be split again.

The split feature is a very imperfect surrogate process when you started a lengthy document without the master/sub architecture. It gives you a rough start point but it must be tuned by hand to suit your needs.

[ajlittoz]

I made a test with LO Writer 6.3.5.2. The dialog is not exactly as described in the guide.

The selection menu is in the bottom left corner of the dialog:

The menu offers to split at

• some outline level present in the document
• some style used in the document

In usual documents, choices intersect as Outline level 1 = Style: Heading 1, etc. but this might not always be the same in special elaborate documents.

I think that you have no interest in splitting different from Outline level 1 because splitting at another level will cause too many subdocuments to be created.

If you see nothing else than Outline level 1, Style: Heading 1 (or other levels) and Style: Default Style, this means your document is poorly styled and adding templates will not bring any new versatility or advantage. You should learn and practice styles before going for templates.

EDIT 2020-03-12 to answer the question about changing the split in a master document

A master document cannot be split. If you think your choice of paragraph style was not right for your purpose, you must restart from scratch with the original document.

Your question may also be about a “hierarchical” split of the original document. Say you split first on outline level 1. This results in a master document referencing all your chapters. But you think the document for chapter 5 is really too big with tens of level 2 subparts. Then, you can split the document for chapter 5 on outline level 2 into a master chap-5 document referencing the multiple chap-5 usb-sub-parts. After that, you go back to the primary master to adjust the reference to chap-5 .odt to chap-5 .odm so that the new secondary master is included instead of the whole chapter.

Note that I don’t recommend this practice because it complicates book maintenance but YMMV.

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In case you need clarification, edit your question (not an answer which is reserved for solutions) or comment the relevant answer.

[ElSid]

This is for a new document … I want to update an existing Master Document so it splits at a different style

[ajlittoz]

Unless I’m wrong, once your master document is created, you cannot split it: the File>Send>Create Master Document is disabled.

If your goal is to create a primary master document linking to secondary master documents, each of these linking to final ordinary documents (this a complex case; I don’t know if this is useful, but it can be done – I tested on a example), you must do it manually.

For that, keep your master with its subdocuments split a level 1. Then process each document in each turn to split it at level 2. I warn you however that maintaining such a hierarchical group of documents may turn into a nightmare.

[ElSid]

My goal, on an existing master document, is to change the break from Style: Title to Style: Subtitle