LibreOffice Writer feature regression: why remove No Character Style from Applied Styles?

[rochfort]

LibreOffice Writer 24.2.3.2. Operating systems: Debian 13 and Windows 11.

I make heavy use of LibreOffice Writer character styles which I customise for each class of document I write. For my convenience, these styles are listed in the Styles sidebar under Character Styles if Applied Styles is selected.

In the past, the Applied Styles list included a No Character Style option. A few updates back this option disappeared. However it’s still available in the Hierarical and All Styles lists. Nowadays removing an applied style is inconvenient. You have to switch to either Hierarical or All Styles, scroll to the top of a large list and click No Character Style. Before, all I had to do was stay in Applied Styles and scroll to the top of a much smaller list.

My question to all of you 1200 users is: do you ever use Character Styles as Applied Styles and do you find it inconvenient that the No Character Style is no longer available?

I would be prepared to raise a bug about this matter but I’m surprised that by now no one else has commented on it. And raising a regression bug usually means buying into a fight with the software architect. (The last time I raised a regression bug, the software architect vigorously defended his actions and did not want to listen to a user’s plea for consistency and convenience).

Does anyone know why the option was removed? Otherwise, does anyone know of a quick way to remove applied character styles?

[mikekaganski]

You believe something works not as it should? Be it a change, or it has always been this way. Just file a bug report. The polls are usually not useful in these cases: let’s say that someone X says “I don’t use it”. Are you satisfied? Does something change, when you hear “Y uses it, and agrees”?

Just file a bug. It will result in a specific reason articulated there; the use cases, and expectations, may be put there, and the end result would be a specific resolution (which, by the way, can be re-visited, if needed). People there will need to think about it anyway; why double the world entropy by doubling the work (here and there)?

[ajlittoz]

Personally I always use Hierarchical view in the style sidepane. But since I don’t like to leave the keyboard to grasp the mouse while I’m writing, I added keyboard shortcuts for the styles I use most. I opted for Alt to reach the character styles as a “mirror” to Ctrl for “usual” paragraph styles (like 0 = Body Text, 1 to 4 in the Heading n family).

To parallel Text Body Ctrl+0 which a return to “standard” style for discourse, I configured Alt+0 for No Character Style.

Keeping my hands on the keyboard is faster than switching to the mouse and back.

[EarnestAl]

Not Probably related to tdf#158504 (didn’t exist in earlier versions) but also specifically reported in tdf#159724 where a workaround of customising the keyboard to associate the No Character style with Ctrl+Shift+M (easy way to remember key sequence) was proposed .

[rochfort]

@mikekaganski: Thanks for your comment. I wasn’t hoping for a poll. Just a pointer to any other activity going on about this matter.

@ajlittoz: Thanks for sharing the way you work with the Hierarchical view and character styles.

@EarnestAl: Bingo! That link to tdf#159724 is just what I needed. The person who raised that software problem report, Adalbert Hanßen, sets out the problem well. I note that there has been no response from the softwre architect even though that SPR was raised in February 2024.

[mikekaganski]

@rochfort

Bingo! That link to tdf#159724 is just what I needed

And what happened here? I can tell: you didn’t file your bug report (indeed, because you now know there’s one already - filing it now would be silly); and you even didn’t add yourself to CC. Which means, that that tdf#159724 keeps its default level of “importance”, without duplicates or new CCed people increasing its “weight”. And one can looks at it and tell, that not much people are affected. Sigh.