Agree: we should drop the margins from the page properties in Draw.
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Yes, that would be correct!
Not correct at all. Draw is a capable environment to prepare both vector and raster graphics of any layout (e.g. 36" posters, or 3"x5" postcards). In that context margins (visible now by applying a background to margins) coupled with layout grid, which I find accurate, allows for the composition one needs.
The ‘Align Objects’ context menu controls (Left, Center, Right, Top, Middle, Bottom) do in fact respond relative to a page margins as set. So no we can not just drop margins for the sd module.
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This task can also be solved without margins, e.g. by positioning a rectangle.
In Writer, margins define the area used (automatically!) by the text flow. What specifically do margins do in Draw? The boundaries that you are talking about are just some guides, hints to a user, not something automatically defining anything, nor limiting anything, right? Guidelines are 100% suitable for the task.
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Only sort of, bcz methods delivered by margins give you the ability to perform alignment at an arbitrary distance from the page edge, methods to align relative to a draw shape “rectangle” are not available.
Page margins in the sd module can currently be made visible with a temporary background area fill as noted, so strictly speaking ability to show them as a line is not needed–but the margin definitions and methods for a sd page object are very much required.
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Alignment is a good point. It should be mentioned in the bug.
Then you need to find a way to show the printable area! And you need to make sure it is accurate for every printer that might print that document!
Or… just simply provide the possibility show the margins on the page.
BTW: The “Position” of objects (F4) is defined by the margins. The Position X = 0.00 is right up against the left margin, and the Position Y = 0.00 is right up against the top margin - as it should be.
I use margins ALL the time when creating Draw documents, for the above and other reasons.
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I was giving possible workarounds.
In my Draw document I made little squares in the corners on a non-printing layer to emulate the crop marks in your screenshot. I assumed you wanted those rather then the Border outline (Tools > Options > LibreOffice Writer > Formatting Aids > Object Boundaries > Border Outline)
Until the bug is resolved the easiest way is to create a new layer, draw a rectangle starting very slightly outside the top left margin so the start will automatically begin at the margin and drag it down to the bottom right margin. Once again the end point will want to align itself with the margin. Set the fill to None and the lines to grey. Set the layer to Visible, Non printing, Locked. Save as template
LetterPageWithMargin.odg (9.2 KB)
As long as the standard for pages (printed or otherwise displayed) is rectangular, the “box model” (setting the text document apart as a text entity, page by page) is equally (if not more) relevant for a graphical document.
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Sorry, but don’t you see a contradiction here? There is no “text document”, when we are talking about Draw; there’s even more no “page by page” for the flowing text; and there is no text content for the page in Draw. For any element that can have text content, the box model applies.
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If I may add my two cents to the discussion about “box model” …
It depends on how you use Draw.
When you use Draw to produce “printable” documents, i.e. documents relevant by themselves (remember Impress and Draw are two facets of the same component), then margins are important. It is not a matter of text flow. It only aims at guaranteeing that everything set in a “page” (or slide if you prefer) will be visible, no matter the output device, screen, printer, whatever.
On the contrary, when Draw is only a scratchpad containing decorations for documents created with other components, such as Writer or Calc, margins do not matter. The Draw document is only a storage medium allowing to design and edit illustrations which are then pasted somewhere else. Such a scratchpad is not intended to be “printed” or sent by itself.
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Many of us give special use cases to margins. For example, we can use for marking an area we want to preserve in a final composition because we have a pre-impressed paper. Or maybe, we want to adjust it for marking (without drawing them) the cutting lines in a pre-production for cutting a specific format of paper.
Also, the printer is not the unique way to generate results with Draw. We would want to generate a PDF document, a PNG photo or SVG elements, that contemplate that zone.
Please, think that the best feature of Draw has always been the variety of uses given by users.
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While you wait for bug 165770 to be resolved
Create a template along the lines of the sample I made in in comment 21 above. The margin is locked, visible but not printable.
Or you can revert to 24.8 or earlier which shows margins, possibly only if Writer also shows margins
While you wait for bug 165770 to be resolved
Margins are critically important for doing layout for professional printing.
… and the warning concerning the printable area from printer info would no longer annoy us.
Restored for the 25.8 release, as for tdf#164505 and visibility of the margins boundaries now controlled by expert config stanza for Draw of ‘ShowBoundary’. Currently no direct toggle for Draw in the UI.
Test a nightly or pre-release.
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There is a strange coupling between Writer and Draw. Or rather, the controls for the various boundaries are common between the various components but not all components have UI for them.
If you want to see “page margins”:
- open a new text document
File>New>Text Document - in the text document,
View>Text Boundaries - get rid of the text document
Draw now shows the usable area within the page.
Fedora 41 with KDE Plasma desktop, LO 24.8.5.2
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Doesn’t work here. (Version: 25.2.1.2 (X86_64), Windows 10)
Also, it’s called View>Boundaries (not: View>Text Boundaries)
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The same here:
Version: 25.2.2.2 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: 520(Build:2)
CPU threads: 12; OS: Linux 6.11; UI render: default; VCL: gtk3
Locale: es-ES (es_ES.UTF-8); UI: es-ES
Ubuntu package version: 4:25.2.2-0ubuntu0.24.04.1~lo1
Calc: threaded
I DON’T EVEN HAVE THE “View” > “Boundaries”. Not in “View” menu nor Draw Settings Options.