working with frames specifically labels

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#1

Appreciate that frames can be problematic, but they are the way that the label pages are created and frankly tables become so cumbersome to achieve a similar result that I’ve learned to live with them as I print a lot of food related labels with graphics and text.
Unfortunately also there are few tutorials on using frames - presumably because they don’t always work well. As a result I’m not sure if my experiences are my own lack of understanding, a bug in the code or design features.

Perhaps those more knowledgeable could help with the items below. Remember all this is based on use of A4 pages with frames generated by File|New|Label

Thanks.

  1. Frame selection.The most annoying feature is that I am unable to multi select frames on a page. I want to do this in order to delete the content (clear the frames). Selecting and clearing 20 - 40 frames individually is a pain and waste of time. Is this possible/meant to be possible? If not why not?
  2. Copy and paste content. Most of the time I can select all within a frame, copy it and then once in another frame if I paste it copies both the text and the image(s). Occasionally though a document will lose this ability and just paste the text. I then have to recreate the document from one that I know has this ability. Essentially I paste into n frames a copy of a label because I need that many. Any ideas gratefully accepted as to why.
  3. Is it possible to move between frames using a keyboard command (both forward and backward)? If so, how. Happy if the solution is a macro with an associated key
  4. In an attempt to overcome some of these I have tried a couple of times to link frames so that I can then treat content as one big blob. What I have found is that a label created set of frames is logically named 1,2,3 … from left to right and top to bottom. However when you try to link the frames many of them are missing from the next or prev dropdowns and it’s not possible to type a name (prob a good idea as long as the drop down has the correct list!)
  5. Frame background. I’ve tried to use the frame’s background to add colour to a label. If I set one frame on the page say red then all the frames take the same colour. Why? They aren’t linked?
#2

I suggest using Draw for your labels:

  1. Multi-select by drawing selection around grouped items (that is text, pictures, shapes, smaller groups)
  2. Copy and paste group always works. Also, for layout just paste the number of items in a column, position first and last items and use distribute to fill in-between groups. You can also use guides to place items, you can align items and groups.
  3. Right-click on item and select position and size to move it numerically
  4. Group all repeated groups as one group
  5. You can change backgrounds individually

Cheers, Al

A bit later:

It seems that I have used Writer but with a frame inside a table and not using label tool at all. Just create the first label inside a frame inside the first cell then the frame can be pasted into remaining cells without further positioning. See Plum and starwberry jam labels 2018.odt

#3

Thanks for the response.
I’d not considered using draw (or calc) but I can’t see it being easier.

Effectively you’re using a table to position the frames, rather than using frame positioning. The frames appear to behave more “normally” in that e.g. background isn’t linked across frames.

To be honest, 1 - 3 are more the issues that affect me. 4 & 5 are things I’ve noted and I’d like to know if this is correct behaviour or not and why.

For 3 - point is to navigate using the k/b. I cut my computer teeth before window systems so for me k/b is quick & I always look for k/b equivalents. Sadly mouse & now gestures are winning, not always for the better and often at the expense of precision :slight_smile:

I’ll look again tomorrow, but while the method you used certainly allows me to delete all cell content at one stroke, the tradeoff is I need to set up label sheets manually in the first place. As I use std labels already defined in the system this might be a longer route.

Your jam sounds great!

#4

In Draw the dialog for Position and Size is F4.

I have to fess up, I use Inkscape for the jam labels now because I wanted a fancier border which I could create by repeating a shape along a path. However, the way I lay it out using guides to place the copies of the original group is the same

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