Set up left and right pages when section breaks are already present

English
#1

Set up left and right pages when section breaks are already present

My book already has section breaks in it. I want to set up left and right page so I can enter chapter title and book title on the correct sides.

I cannot follow the page set up system. It is simply too hard for me to understand. When I Google or YouTube for solutions it seems that all the instruction I find assumes that I don’t yet have section breaks in my book. However, I have do. Have them.

So I need instruction to set up left and right pages when section breaks are already present, so that I can enter chapter title and book title on the correct sides.

#2

To be able to answer your question, OS name, exact LO version and, most important, save format (.odt vs. .doc(x) are required.

The notion of section in Writer is completely different from M$ Word section.

In Writer, a section is a part of a page. The main usages are to temporarily change the number of columns and to group together a collection of notes. You can’t change header or footer and make them different from what is defined in the page style.

Since sections are mainly intended as a variation of a page style, it is recommended to keep sections inside a sequence of pages controlled by a single side. You can however have sections spanning several page styles, but as “It is simply too hard for me to understand”, don’t play with this advanced feature.

What are your sections? What is their purpose in your book? Please describe the general layout and design.

#3

Version: 7.3.4.2 (x64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: 728fec16bd5f605073805c3c9e7c4212a0120dc5
CPU threads: 8; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 19045; UI render: Skia/Vulkan; VCL: win
Locale: en-GB (en_GB); UI: en-GB
Calc: CL

The purpose of the different sections in the book are to separate the different chapters, which are different parts of advice on how to pet sit.

I didn’t that one should/could set up page styles before creating the chapter via section breaks. So, I entered section breaks (next page) to put each chapter’s first page on the correct side. Where they would be on the wrong side, I have standard page breaks.

General layout and design.
The general layout of the design is the start of each chapter on the left in Libre to make them right in the book.
If this info helps, I used Ariel font. Sizes14 for the body text (justifide), 18 for the Chapter headings in the body (centred). 12 in the headers (centred). However, I removed the headers as I was not able to work out where the problem was when I was getting a chapter title carrying on into the following chapter.
There is a TOC.

P.S.

I just remembred that I was having trouble in Libre. It was either or both that
a) I didn’t know know how to export a document in Libre as a PDF.
b) I didn’t know how to do section breaks in Libre

So, I copied the document into Word.

I don’t recall if i already had the section breaks in at this stgae (Added in Liber). I reall don’t recall if I did the sectkion breaks in Libre or Word.

I have Word on my tiny 7 inch laptop,which I can only see to use if attached to external monitor to see what I am doing, Sadly, I can no longer get the laptop to see the monitor. So am back to Libre on my desktop with the desktop monitor.

At some point I trined to change ODT to Docx but I really don’t know if it changed in the first place or changed back!

Would all tis have messed up the section breaks so that I am getting previos chapter headings continuing in the next? I canot see the section break type to see if the inorect header in one is a Next or Continuos section break. When I correected the header that was continuing the previous heaser, then one ater the corrected one went wrong. So I deceided not to have headers in my book.
But after sulking, I decided I need to have them!

I am currently using Libre as I now know how to save as a PDF in libre.

#4

Beter than search in google or youTube, you can read the documentation in wich there are some examples In which there are enough examples of how to work with LibreOffice.

Getting Started Guide has a chapter dedicated to Writer and the Writer Guide deepens the Writer functions

Apart from these readings, it would be convenient for you to attach an example file to help us help you

#5

According to your comment, your only purpose is to have different headers on left and right pages. There is no point in using sections to achieve this.

Writer provides Left Page and Right Page page styles which are locked respectively at left and right. These page styles automatically alternate. All you have to do is assign the ad hoc style at start of the sequence:

  1. put the cursor in the initial page
  2. double-click on the desired page style name in the Navigator sidepane
    You display the Navigator either by clicking on the “T” icon (at right) or with Styles>`Manage Styles (F11). The page styles are listed after a click on the fourth icon from left in the pane top toolbar.

You also want to always start on left page. It is very easy to make it automatic without the need for manual page breaks (which must be revewed when you edit your text like everything manual). Assuming your chapter headings are styled Heading 1, modify Heading 1 `Text Flow* configuration:

  • in Breaks section, tick Insert (for Page Before)
  • tick With page style
  • select Left Page from the drop-down menu
  • OK

In the left page header, type the book title. In case you have several page styles needing the book title, it might be handier to:

  1. define the title in File>Properties, Description tab
  2. wherever you need the title in your text, Insert>Field>Title
  3. in the left page header, Insert>Field>Title

The current chapter heading is inserted in the right page header with Document tab, Type Heading, Up to level 1. This relies on the fact your chapter headings are styled Heading 1.

Note I used adjective current: the heading is automatically changed when you change chapter. The heading no longer “carries on into the following chapter”

This sentence betrays the fact that you are used to M$ Word workflow. As I already pointed out, the “section” feature is radically different between Word and Writer. What Word calls “section” is approximately done in Writer with a page style (but there is no Continuous option in Writer page styles). Writer sections allow to temporarily alter page geometry; it does not allow to change header nor footer.

This has surely messed up your document. It is even possible that you can no longer clean it or fix it. Due to the difference in the “section” feature, you may have ended up with one single-shot page style per page during the conversion process. If this is the case, trying to fix the layout is a very very tedious manual process. It is faster to:

  1. start a fresh blank document,
  2. configure your required styles,
  3. paste your existing text as unformatted text,
  4. apply styles (paragraph, character, page)

in that order.

@bantoniof suggested to read Writer documentation. Start with the Writer Guide for a general description of the application. I highly recommend excellent Bruce Byfield’s Designing with LO which will introduce you to style philosophy.

1 Like
#6

I think it did partially mess it up but I didn’t end up with one page style per page.

Thank you to those of you who have helped so far. Since my message I have been busy on the task. I ended up using my tiny 7 inch latop with Word on it and likely making my poor eyesight even poorer! I certainly got neck and back pain from leaning down so I was about 2 inches from the screen to see!

I sorted out some problems in Word. I have given up o Libre for now.

The issue now with the Word version is that one of the chapter pages still has the chapter title in the header and some had to sacrifice the book title on the even pages to sort out a more important format issue (I don’t recall what now but to do with headers or footers. I am satisfied enough for now, until I learn how to do this all correctly and might edit again at a later date. Few people will notice and be bothered that one of the chapter pages has header text and one chapter is missing the header text. The pages that need them have page numbers and the chapters all start on the correct side. I’m happy for now!
I will try the suggestion of The LibreOffice Bookshelf another time in the future, when I have overcome the stress!

Take care all x

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