Libreoffice Writer does not continue in chapter numbering

[janchytry]

Hey,
I guess I have a specific problem in Write I could not find a solution for. I will describe it naively, hoping someone can help me figure it out or spot a bug. Here’s the problem:

I set chapter numbering based on Heading levels in Tools -> Chapter Numbering... for the whole document as such:

1

1.1

1.1.1
etc

Now I:

1. selected Heading 1 style, turned on numbering with Toggle Numbered List and wrote something
2. entered a new line, selected Heading 2 style, turned on numbering with Toggle Numbered List and wrote something
3. entered a new line, selected Text Body style, wrote some text and a bulleted list
4. entered a new line, selected Heading 1 style, turned on numbering with Toggle Numbered List which caused reverting the numbering to 1. Of course, it should be 2, so I right-clicked -> Continue Previous Numbering, which caused the continuation of the bulleted list from the Text Body style above.

I cannot seem to find an option to accurately continue the numbering of the Heading 1 even though it was set globally in Chapter numbering...

Thanks!

[janchytry]

Thanks for the answer!

I thought Chapter Numbering and Toggle Number List would be conflicting attributes, and would happily use Chapter Numbering only.

If it worked.

I think I expressed myself incorrectly before. When I select Heading 1 style later after the bulleted list, Writer restarts it by default to 1, careless of previous Heading n’s. There is no continuation I’d expect as I had done my preliminary settings in Chapter Numbering.

[ajlittoz]

This is no solution to your problem. Move it either as an edit to your question or as a comment under my answer.

If it still doesn’t work, please attach a reduced version of your file (3 pages max) to you question (edit, then use the paperclip tool) so that I can anlyse it. If needed anonymise your data.

[mikekaganski]

Are you by chance using DOC(X)?

[janchytry]

Yes, I do. Do you think, it would be a compatibility issue?

[mikekaganski]

Definitely. There’s no chapter numbering in Word, and the conversion of this between the Writer’s feature and Word format is imperfect. See tdf#130446.

[ajlittoz]

Chapter numbering and Toggle Numbered List are incompatible and conflicting attributes. With the list button, you create lists, which is a contiguous sequence of numbered items (this is simplified for a quick explanation). When you enter your second Heading 1 and turn on numbered list mode, you create a second list which has its own sequence of numbers as you would expect for different lists.

You were right in setting properties in Tools>Chapter Numbering. They apply to the Heading n family of styles. There nothing more to do. Just use the Heading n styles and your chapters will get numbered.

To show the community your question has been answered, click the ✓ next to the correct answer, and “upvote” by clicking on the ^ arrow of any helpful answers. These are the mechanisms for communicating the quality of the Q&A on this site. Thanks!

[Genom]

In case you are wondering, why despite all the effort it isn’t working, in my case, I had to switch headings back and forth (e.g. Heading 2 paragraph selected, switched to Heading 3 (numbering should appear now) and then switched back to Heading 2. This solved my issue.
I am using LO 7.3 on Ubuntu 18.04.
I was using Headings 1, 2, 3 and they were all set up under paragraph styles (changed from existing Headings 1, 2, 3. I used Tools/Chapter Numbering… as such:

I have 3 different page styles for different pagination, figures and Zotero managed citations. What got my attention was that here in the tool bar, it looked different than this:

It was instead of the ordered list, the No List option was activated and by pressing on it I was not able to deactivate it. I do not remember activating this option but I was working on this document for quite some time, hence my memory is fuzzy.

[ajlittoz]

Could you, please, elaborate a bit? Such a stance should not be necessary. Edit your answer to mention OS name and LO version, perhaps save format. Describe with more details how your headings are configured. If you used toolbar buttons to add numbering, this is an error.

[Genom]

I did. Please see my edits with the screenshots above.

[ajlittoz]

When using Heading n and Tools>Chapter Numbering, the toolbar buttons display is irrelevant and often doesn’t reflect the present state (cursor in the heading), because chapter numbering lives in a different space than list numbering.

Never push these buttons when the cursor is in the heading. You’ll mess up both chapter and list numbering, creating a confusion for Writer faced with two conflicting numbering.

The only explanation that I can guess is you have some form of direct formatting on your heading. Have you tried Ctrl+M before changing paragraph style?

Eventually attach a sample file presenting the issue.

[Genom]

No I did nottry Ctrl+M. I might have used list numbering for something else but I know the problem, therefore I don’t think I used it on the Headings. I will not be able to provide a sample file. However, I will observe this issue with other files to see if it occurs with them. I will report here, if I find something interesting.

[mikekaganski]

Indeed, while the numbering controls on the formatting toolbar are unrelated to the chapter numbering, they still show correct status of the chapter-numbered paragraphs, so it’s the correct finding that you described: the “normal” state of the buttons on headings is shown on your screenshot; when you create an unnumbered heading (e.g., by putting cursor to the very beginning of the heading, and pressing Backspace), it will show No List button activated instead.