Preceding text gets deleted when 'Co' is typed in Writer

English
#1

I am using LibreOffice Write on Ubuntu 22.04.

I have found that sometimes, especially when I am working near the bottom of the text pane, if I type Co a bunch of the preceding text gets deleted (That is capital C followed by a small o).
The text that disappears includes the C and usually a few lines of the preceding text.
When it happens, I can Ctrl-Z to recover the deleted text.
I assume that I am accidentally typing some keyboard shortcut but I have not been able to locate anything in the docs.
It happens often enough that I would really like to disable whatever shortcut I am triggering. I am not a touch typist and generally do not use keyboard shortcuts. My current long document includes the word Council a lot, so this is very annoying.
I would appreciate any suggestions.

#2

Sounds unusual. It might be best to check if there is a shortcut to delete to beginning of line, sentence or paragraph.

Click Tools > Customise, in the dialogue that eventually opens select the Keyboard tab. In the middle of the pane there is an empty field named Functions, type delete in it. The middle pane of three just below named Function will show delete functions, click on each to see if there is a shortcut in the pane labelled Keys. I would expect a shortcut of Shift+Ctrl+C or similar as I suspect you might be hitting the Ctrl key too. If there is a keyboard shortcut like that you can remove it by selecting the line in the Keys pane, then clicking the Delete button on the right near the top of the pane.

#3

This is very mysterious: I found the settings page with your help, but there don’t seem to be any shortcuts set that involve shift C, alone or with anything else, or any that involve o with or without the shift

#4

You didn’t say what happens to the o, if it is left after the rest is deleted then it could be the shortcut is select to beginning of line, sentence or paragraph. So you select to say the beginning of paragraph with Shift+Ctrl+C and as soon as you press the o it replaces your selection with itself.

The default setting for select to beginning of paragraph is Shift+Ctrl+Up, could you have hit that combination? The right Shift key is directly above the Up arrow on my keyboard.

#5

Do you perhaps have an Autotext entry defined with the shortcut “Co”?

#6

It could delete text?

#7

@LeroyG, I was considering the possibility that the Autotext could be blank text: but on reflection that would not overwrite preceding text, I guess.

1 Like
#8

I don’t think it is that: I am left handed and not a touch typist so my right shift key is rarely used. (I often type with one hand on the keyboard and one on the mouse) I don’t think my typing hand is near the up arrow side of the keyboard when this happens

#9

In this case, I would suggest that you thoroughly test your keyboard - it is quite possible that this is a malfunction there.

2 Likes
#10

Left or right?
Is it a regular external keyboard?

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