Hyperlink: New Bookmarks not showing

English
#1

LibreOffice Bookmark/Hyperlink function is much more difficult than WPS. Chgd to LO when my version of WPS quit working with Win10. I’ve only used it a few times with LibreOffice and hate it.

What I use it for is in documents - creating hundreds of page with different info, then linking to the title of each particular bookmark. For example, one of the things I have is a list of authors I’ve read/want to read, along with the books they’ve written. I created a ToC, where I bookmark the authors at the place in the doc where they are, then I create a hyperlink at the beginning alphabetically.

Yesterday I updated LO to 7.1.7.2 and today I’m trying to insert a hyperlink but the bookmark I created isn’t showing in the list. When I go back to the bookmark, it’s there in the list, but hyperlink isn’t recognizing it. FYI, LO has many more fields that have to be filled in, instead of simple buttons like Word, (in WPS, I would click on This Document (or something like it), then a pull down list of the bookmarks…and that was it. No typing!) so I’ve never felt comfortable using this function with LO, avoiding it as much as possible. Yet today, after the update, I can’t seem to use it at all.

Am I missing something? Did the update change the way hyperlinks & bookmarks function?

Sorry about the tag I was forced to choose. I’m assuming it’s writer?

#2

Remember that switching to a new application needs a mind adjustment.

In LO, bookmarks are essentially used for navigation (in the beginning I used them as you do for cross-references; it works but this is not the right purpose). References to text elements should be encoded as cross-references.

Your document description is not fully clear for me. Rewording it: you’re trying to create a book with one “chapter” per author and you want to create an “active” TOC where a Ctrl+click (this is how hyperlinks work in Writer) will scroll you to this chapter.

This is quite easy with LO Writer:

  • Assign style Heading 1 to the paragraphs containing the author’s name (this will become the start of the chapter)
  • put the cursor where you want the TOC and Insert>TOC & Index>TOC, Index or Bibliography
    The TOC is creating from all Heading n paragraphs and a hyperlink is automatically added

You can customise your chapter beginning by modifying Heading 1 built-in paragraph style. E.g. you can force a page break before the heading, change font properties, alignment and indents (= paragraph extra margins), …

Important reminder: to activate any link in Writer, you must Ctrl+click, not only click on it.

#3

EEKS! That’s too much. No, the document I’m talking about is a 600+ page list of authors and their works. For example, M C Beaton…I have several pages of her books that I reference for reading. I put her name at the top then list the books below, in various fashion…then I Bookmark her name and Hyperlink that Bookmark on the first few pages in alphabetical order. I then Ctrl+Click on her name to go to her page. That way I do not have to add authors in alphabetical order AND I can get to “W” names as easily as “B” names.

I’ve been using LO for a couple of years and still find it hard to navigate. Oddly, my version of Word works with Win10 in all processes except document, thus my need for LO. As I said, I have more than 600 pages and would like to continue to use this document as has been set up for several years. Changing now is out of the question.

So back to my original question for anyone familiar with the Bookmark/Hyperlink process…is Hyperlink still working with the update?

#4

What is too much? You just need to “tag” the paragraph containing author name (e.g. M C Beaton) with paragraph style Heading 1. Of course, you must do it for every author name but no extra typing is needed.

Then, you create a TOC at the beginning of your book and everything is automatically collected. The only “glitch” is the names appear in document order, not alphabetical order. You can get alphabetical order with an Alphabetical Index but no hyperlink is automatically generated because you can have several references to the same key and Writer does not know which one to choose.

If you want to experiment, make a copy first so that you don’t damage your original file.

Very important: you didn’t tell in which format your file is saved. If it is .doc(x), you’ll always encounter compatibility issues because Writer is not Word and both applications are based on different principles for which there is no one-to-one correspondence (needing approximations resulting in differences or loss of formatting).

#5

I have a document of over 600 pages with several pages of hyperlinks. I wish to CONTINUE to use the current method of bookmark/hyperlink. I do not wish to completely remake everything based on what you are suggesting, and have been clear as to what it is I want.

I would prefer to hear from someone who will address my ORIGINAL request, which was to know why the bookmark/hyperlink didn’t seem to be working after I updated. I don’t want a “lesson” in doing something that is irrelevant to my needs.

#6

You probably won’t hear from many people because most people will use a faster way.
From what I understand

  1. You create a bookmark in your text
  2. You go to the start and enter a line where the new entry will go
  3. You then create a Hyperlink to the bookmark in the document, selecting from the list as image below
    HyperlinkToBookmark
    HyperlinkToBookmark876×613 19.7 KB

This is clunky. If you are not going to change, it would be quicker to insert cross-references. Click Insert > Field > More fields (Ctrl+F2). Select the Cross-references tab and under Type choose Bookmarks, under Insert reference to select Reference, then under Selection choose your author. This would be quicker than inserting hyperlinks as the settings remain the same if you leave the window open; if the window is closed the two left panes remain as set during a session. As a bonus, you don’t need to press Ctrl to follow a link.

ManualTOC
ManualTOC1238×1025 35.4 KB

BTW the Writer Guide pdf can be downloaded from English documentation | LibreOffice Documentation - Your documentation for LibreOffice

Coming back to your question, can you see the missing bookmark in the Sidebar under Navigator? If not, it might be broken.

#7

I’m beginning to think no one here understands what clunky means. I say this is what I’ve been doing for years, even with LibreOffice, and EVERYONE wants to tell me to do something else that actually requires WAY more effort, and then try to sell me that it’s not.

I don’t know how much clearer I can make it - this is a document that I’ve been adding to for several years. It’s personal use only, so I don’t need anything other than what I have, which is actually very simple. Granted it was much simpler with Word, but it stopped working with my newer PC and, as a senior, I don’t have a lot of disposable income for a program that I don’t use very often. I DO NOT want to change it. It makes no sense to do so and would require a ton more work than I want to invest further into it, let alone try to figure out something new that literally has so many more steps.

It worked on Libre for a couple of years and then, after an update, it doesn’t appear to be working any longer. I wanted mostly to discover if that was the case or if something else was going on, but apparently the LibreOffice people don’t monitor the forums to help people. And everyone else, while I appreciate that they took the time to “answer” my post, seems to be intent on ignoring my actual question and instead foist something else on me. I knew what I was doing and had no problems previously. I’m not a stupid person - ivy-league degree and built my previous computer - but I’m not really interested in having to essentially learn a new process then convert a 600+ document.

This has been a very disappointing experience with LibreOffice and the lack of actual customer service. A user guide is of no use because I actually already know how to do what I WANT TO DO, not the dozen plus steps you and everyone else seem to feel would be so much easier. So frustrating. No one seems to want to listen, they just want to talk.

#8

If you really intend to be helped, help us to technically understand the issue. Telling you want to continue to work as before is a goal but doesn’t explain WHY it stopped to work. The description of your procedure is not clear at all because vocabulary is different in Word and Writer. The same word may cover different technical realities.
The best you can do is prepare a sample file from your document. Make it 1 or 2 pages long with at least 3 authors and 5 books per author and attach it to a comment. Then forensic examination will be possible.

#9

3 months and my question still not answered. Not even confirmation or correction of my description of how I thought you were creating your hyperlinks. Nobody can help you if you don’t give a coherent description of the problem.

The description of how to create a TOC given by ajlittoz would take around an hour of work if 600 authors need Heading 1 applied and working leisurely.

The alternative suggestions offered were to help you save time and effort. They also try to preempt the XY problem

BTW This is the guide - How to use the Ask site?

#10

This is called a regression, and - as explained in the How To Use This Site (which you naturally read, haven’t you?), should be reported elsewhere. Of course, with specific, exact steps that worked in a previous version (which exactly?) and don’t work anymore in a later one. Besides, you could of course ask how to return to an older version, and stick to it for the time being, or test current version (which is either 7.2.6 or 7.3.1 at the time of me writing this) if that has it changed.

Lol. You expect a volunteer-driven project to have a customer service??? Are you a customer? People here are users. A customer service requires an income to pay salaries to the people listening and answering (which is a natural thing, right?). If a program is provided for free by an organization that is not a corporation providing you a free service as a promotion of their paid products, how could you expect a customer service?

Possibly. People here, the power users, help people on their own terms. You come here, and ask, and they decide how to answer. And their goal is often not to create a nice impression, but to teach a user to do something in a way that helped them, and made their life easier. And that’s fair; you are free to not follow, but you would do bad if you started to discourage contributors from doing that (you didn’t do that by complaining and telling others that they disservice you, right?)

As explained elsewhere, you are free to have a support contract from people who actually take money for the service. That would be not only having someone to listen, but also a way for you to contribute (because those people providing commercial support are active contributors, and contracting them helps them keep productive in the project).

1 Like
#11

Here’s a thought…maybe you guys should stop being so condescending. You know what I’m trying to do and you pretend you don’t. I’ve been very clear about the issue, and it seems that you “Power users” (wow, SMH) should know how to bookmark and hyperlink. All I was wanting to know is if there was a change in a recent update that prevented it from continuing to work. That’s it. Instead, I’m being chastised for not responding for 3 months, told I’m unclear, I should do it another way, and so on. Why should I respond? Telling me that assistance is on your terms and that I’m not showing the proper gratitude while being “assisted”, when what’s actually happening has nothing to do with my issue but is trying to push me in a direction that makes no sense, is dismissive and unhelpful. Unfortunately, forums that rely on user assistance have become the norm, which means people more interested in posing and flexing their superior tech muscle than in providing help. But us silly folks who aren’t worthy are left with few options. I’m a struggling senior and, if I could pay for it, I would purchase MS, because it is much more user-friendly than Libre. I don’t use a word program very much, mostly for a few personal items, so spending that kind of money isn’t something I can do, so I foolishly thought I had the right to use Libre like anyone else.

#12

Thanks but I’m done. I find it odd that so many “power users” don’t seem to grasp how to bookmark and hyperlink. I was clear and coherent and your dismissive attitude is why I did not respond. It seems as if you guys are less interested in helping than you are in trying to change something to the way YOU like to do it. Even after I said I did not want to do it the way you guys wanted me to. This is the pitfall of having help forums that require user assistance, the “power users” are more interested in posing and less interested in assisting.

#13

Frankly, this is a damned disrespectful post considering how many support volunteers (including a LO Developer) have tried to help.

If you are unwilling to even accept advice (or change your approach) then you have no grounds for complaint. IMHO.

1 Like
#14

You ask for help, I ask for clarification. Nothing.
Goodbye

Impressum (Legal Info) | Datenschutzerklärung (Privacy Policy)   Content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0 license.