Hello,
I’m just trying out v6.4.7.2 on Linux (Mint) and want to set some tabs in my document.
I noticed, when I’m selecting the whole document (with or without text in it), open the menu item Format-> Paragraph there is no section for tabs on the dialog box,
When I’m selecting no line (or just one line of the text) and open the same menu item, there is a section for setting tabs. It shows the same behavior when I double click on the (horizontal) ruler.
Is there an intention behind it I don’t get or is this a bug?
If I remember correct that did not happened in v6.x
What are your thoughts?
Here LO 7.6.4.1, Fedora 39
No such behaviour. What you’re trying to do is direct formatting. Though direct formatting will always play nasty tricks on your back later, this is allowed.
I don’t think you have experienced the benefits of Writer yet, especially the benefits of styles.
If you are asking for tabs, it indicates that you want to use Writer like a typewriter.
Before you continue calling for tabs, please describe exactly what you want to achieve in your text.
For example, you can say, I want the first line of a pragraph to be indented from the margin by x cm, etc.
Thank you.
Here you go…
In a text document I want to set a tab on position x applied to the whole text.
HTH
You could achieve this by adding an indent to the standard paragraph style.
And it would probably be even easier to extend the margin accordingly in the page style.
But why would it be that I can’t set a tab when double clicking on the ruler under the described circumstances as described in my initial posting?
You set a tab with single-click. Double-clicking in the ruler opens a more general dialog equivalent to Format>Paragraph to change all possible parameters related to a pargraph (“geometrry”).
Your click in the ruler set the tab. But your text was not changed to react to the tab stop. I emphasise word stop because a tab stop ends some action triggered in the text by pressing Tab.
If your text contains no tab, then setting as many tabs as you can will have strictly no effect.
If you want to change paragraph side alignment, change either the indents in the ruler (up-pointing triangles; but this is direct-formatting) or the paragraph style configurations. If you want to change all your text, change the page margins.
As I described in my initial posting, the ‘one-click’ tab settings doesn’t work when I have selected the whole text in the document. Neither through a single click nor the menu option "Format->Paragraph’.
If no text is selected (CTRL-A) the tab settings works but it applies only to the current line.
What am I missing here?
Works for me.
Such a setting does not apply to a “single line” but to a whole paragraph. Your paragraphs are probably one-liners?
See tdf#63356.
It definitely was there, all way since OpenOffice.org, till v.7.5, where it was finally fixed.
My thought is that v.6.4 ir really outdated. It’s difficult to discuss anything about such an old version - people will likely see something different.
See e.g. Update to Latest Version
- set the tab stops in one paragraph
- select the other paragraphs
- choose menu
Edit-Repeat: Apply Atributes
When the paragraphs have different indents (the specific scenario which @drobble has, in which case there was no Tabs in Paragraph dialog), the ruler does not allow to (re)set tabs. This is true even today; and only in 7.5, the dialog re-gained the tabs in this case. So no, 7.1 wouldn’t help here. Sorry, my objection was because I misunderstood what was proposed here.
Different attribute, similar steps:
Also tested with versions 6.4.7.2 on Windows 6.1 (x86).
But this is different than what was asked here. You can set indents, true; but OP didn’t say they want to reset indents; what they needed was to define tabs in these differently indented paragraphs.