Suggestion for a feature enhancement to Writer

[surfbathing]

I tried to follow a filing an enhancement link, it led to reporting bugs, so I’m putting this out there in the forum. I love LibreOffice, more and more as time using it passes. But as a journalist it would be great if “TK” (our abbreviation for “to come”) could be automatically flagged with a “TK” populating in the margin for easy locating and addressing the outstanding issue. Substack’s composer does this perfectly, for an example in practice.

It doesn’t sound like much, and asking the forum if it was a feature I was just missing confirmed it isn’t and suggested I use a comment to insert a TK. This was very nice but missed the point of speed in using TK inline as a journalist types under deadline. Having the TK populate in the non-printing margin makes it easy for the reporter and editor to see what is yet outstanding in the draft and make sure that it gets addressed.

I am not the only journalist using LibreOffice, I am sure all of us would appreciate a TK function working as Substack has made it work (typing TK populates a TK in the margin and deleting that TK in the text makes the marginal TK notation vanish. Thanks so much!

[LeroyG]

@surfbathing

led to reporting bugs

You can choose there for enhancements.

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Anyway, why not a comment? Just press Ctrl+Alt+C, any key (character, number or Enter), Esc.
Of course, TK are two keys, not five as the workaround proposed; but the comment goes away with Backspace or Delete.

Another workaround: Create an AutoCorrect entry that inserts a striking symbol (i.e., a full block: █ U+2588, or a colorful emoji).

[ajlittoz]

Compared to Can LibreOffice add a “TK” flagging mechanism?, you added an extra requirement: “Having the TK populate in the non-printing margin …”.

This can be handled by AutoText. The entry is now made of text “TK” or whatever to which a small text frame containing “TK” is attached and anchored.

As already mentioned in the other question, apply a dedicated character style to text “TK”. The frame also has its dedicated frame style with main properties:

• anchored to character,
• fixed size (just enough to contain “TK”)
• position inside margin
• Allow overlap unticked (for a strange reason, it is ticked by default which prevents automatic repositioning)

Create a dedicated paragraph style for text inside the frame so that you can highlight this “TK” tag any way you like.

Since my new suggestion now uses a frame, take highest care to avoid any direct formatting after inserting your AutoText entry otherwise you’ll mess up the frames.

All it takes is to type the AutoText name and F3 to insert the “TK” tag in the text flow (with its fancy highlighting) and simultaneously have another (highlighted) “TK” in the margin at the same height as the entry (if the frame style is correctly configured).

[Hrbrgr]

Have a look at

Can LibreOffice add a “TK” flagging mechanism?

I’m a longtime Open/LibreOffice user and a journalist. One of the quirks of my world is the use of “TK” or “TKTK” in a body of writing to indicate that something missing is “to come.” This is used to flag sources to be cited, information yet outstanding, or really about anything in the draft of something that will be filed. Reporters and editors use this shorthand to move quickly through the review of a document and as a reminder of work ahead. There are word processing interfaces that flag TK b…