Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 20692
Want to link character style to paragraph style
Last modified: 2017-03-17 20:26:43 UTC
I'd like to have a way to link a Character Style to a Paragraph Style so that I may could make sure that the default text style of a certain kind of paragraph is *identical* would be identical to the one I get when selecting text and assigning a specific character style to it? A concrete case when I want this: In a technical document I'm writing, I have some segments of code or commands. I'm using a special paragraph style to make these stand out from the explanatory text; it has special indentation, a different (monospace) font etc. Now, I also sometimes include short commands inside the normal contents, and I want these to have special appearance, usually by assigning a special character style to them. What I need is a way to make sure these two styles (the paragraph and the character one) will always have the same appearance. Someone pointed out to me that I could at least sync the styles via text selection + New Style from Selection + click existing style in Create Style. What I want is essentially a way to automate that process. I've also be thinking that maybe Paragraph Styles ought not to have direct character attribute settings at all, but *always* refer to a Character Style. There would need to be a simple way to update both styles at once, though.
reassigned to bh
See issue 15265.
I thought about this again now, after somebody added a note to the report. I would like to suggest the following changes to the "Paragraph Styles" dialog: 1. Remove the "Font", "Font Effects" and "Position" tabs. 2. In the "Background" page, remove the "For->Paragraph/Character style combo box; this page will alway set paragraph background. 3. Add a new page "Characters", using a similar layout to the current one for "Numbering", but allowing selection between character styles rather than numbering styles. 4. Add buttons "Edit" and "New" to the Characters page, popping up the "Character Style" box for the existing style selection or a new style, respectively. When the user presses OK in Character Style after opening it via "New", the new style is automatically selected. 5. Also add "New" and "Edit" to the Numbering page for consistency. The actual paragraph attribute layout will have to be updated to match this, of course.
To grep the issues easier via "requirements" I put the issues currently lying on my owner to the owner "requirements".
>(...) I would like to suggest the following changes to the "Paragraph Styles" dialog: <(...)Remove the "Font"(...) I cannot agree to that. This is too much change and will confuse users used to use previous way of working. I would rather appreciate to have there, in a "Font" tab, a check-box "use specified character style" and a drop down list with all available character styles. Selecting use of character style would then disable all GUI elements for editing properties set via character style - font, effects tab, position tab and combo in background tab. This would satisfy users needing what You need and can be safely ignored by users not needing such a functionality but knowing how to use current Oo version. Same can be done for numbering, using "use numbering style" check-box. *Question: May this require file format change? May this create downwards compatibility issue? If any of those are true I would rather NOT recommend implementing this requirement. *Workaround: it as it can be easily done in a following way: - use one paragraph style for all "code" paragraphs; - use one font style for all in-line "code" items; From time to time run following procedure: Press home Edit->Find&Replace. Show more options Search for style Select paragraph style name Find all Double click on "code" character style in styles list applying "code" character style to all paragraphs selected. Now You may edit paragraph content and new character style will be used everywhere. Changing character style will affect all paragraphs and all inline code. For convenience You may record a macro for doing that. To start a new paragraph with "code" font style forced to it just copy part of previous paragraph and paste it where new code section starts. *Note: Having "the same appearance" for code blocks and in-line code fragments inside a text does not mean, from editor's point of view, to have exactly the same character style. The code paragraph must be readable, correctly indented and etc. The inlined code must obviously look the same but it's size and location must be such that line height of text do not change. Otherwise You will have an awkwardly looking text with lines with code fragments having more space above and below it. As editor may decide on font size for plain text to be different than he/she decides for code paragraphs it may be wise to have separate character styles anyway.
It is not necessary to remove the tabs right away. To smooth the change of interface it is possible to keep selected character style properties as tabs in paragraph style edit dialog for some time. But the tabs should mention that all changes will apply to the character style, not just current paragraph. The duplicated tabs can be removed after appropriate delay in versions.