I am using writer to edit a resume. I have a bullet list I want to change the indent and spacing after the bullet. I open what I think is the property editor for styles, and select a paragraph of the style I want to edit. I change the paragraph to what I want and select “Update selected style.” The paragraph I edited is returned to the original. Is there a way to make this change the default. I have also tried to manually edit the indents in the style. These edits only apply to the paragraphs selected while editing. It does not seems styles work as I would expect. I am working on an M2 MacBook pro running Sonoma. Any help?
You didn’t mention LO version nor save format. We can guess the OS is MacOS but which version?
You gave no information on how you format your documents. You complain about styles, but do style exclusively or do you mix styling with direct formatting? How was your bullet list created? With Format>Bullets & Numbering (which is one of the worst hidden form of direct formatting) or with a list style?
Have you read the chapters about styles in the Writer Guide?
When a list style is applied over a paragraph style, left indent and first line indent are configured in the list style and this overrides the paragraph style. Position of the bullet is also defined in the list style.
I’m using version 7.6.3.2 of LO. I use styles exclusively and never use direct formatting unless the intent is to update a style. What is weird is that I have paragraphs that appear to be the same style, but are formatted differently. If I select edit styles from the drop-down menu, I see the correctly formatted style. It seems that form some reason, it is not applying the change globally.
What I discovered, accidentally, is that if I select multiple paragraphs of the style that I want to change, and it includes paragraphs of the same style but different formatting, then the values in the indent cells go blank. Clicking in one of the indent cells correctly formats the selected paragraphs.
This can’t be how it’s intended to work.
This is no solution to your problem. You should have added it to your question (this site is not a forum and contribution are editable). Please do so or repost as a comment, then delete your “non-answer” (only you, as post owner, can do this).
When you select several paragraph with different formatting (meaning you have direct formatting over them), the conflicting values cannot be represented by a single “common” value. Therefore, Writer blank the settings to warn you something is not consistent.
This can’t happen if you practice strict styling. And this is the intended workflow.
Agreed. It is the only way to apply the change to the style though.
Since I am practicing strict styling, your final statement is obviously incorrect.
The thing I notice is that if I hit a carriage return after a paragraph with the desired format, I get a paragraph with the desired format. This style matches the paragraph formatting that I get when I look at the style in Styles->Edit Styles. If I change the style and change it back. I get something different. This matches what I see when I look at the Style in the paragraph Properties window. The only difference I see is in the indent for the first line and the subsequent lines (which is what I am changing). Somehow, the solution of selecting two differently formatted paragraphs in the same style, and then clicking on the blank box forces it to override with the value I want. I think if you dig, you’ll find somewhere these two values do not reference the same thing.
I posted some more information. This is clearly a bug.