To make life easier for people migrating to OpenOffice.org and to get around some of the limitations in the find and replace I have written a macro called IanndFindReplace available from: http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/hillview/OOo/ The instructions for installing in OOo2.0 need updating but if you look at the instructions for installing libraries for the KeyHandler, you should be able to work it out.
However, I think that it is time that my macro is retired and that similar features be part of standard OOo. Namely: * Ability to select regular expressions so that they don't have to be remembered or looked up in help; * Work across paragraphs and not just within paragraphs; * Fix the anomaly of \n being line breaks in Find but paragraph breaks in Replace; * Ability to search for and replace character and paragraph styles at the same same time as an expression for text; * Define the styles for the replaced text. E.g. If replacing a paragraph break be able to say which paragraph style the resulting merged paragraph will have - the first paragraph or the second. My macro can't do the following but these features should be included: * Extend the concept to any formatting e.g. be able to find H2O where the 2 is subscripted as opposed to all H2O or conversely to find H2O and to apply the subscript in the replace; * Include groups in replace. (A group is a bracketed expression in a regular expression and this would allow you to find some text but only change a part of it within the found context). * Change the API so that Find can work on a text range. I hope that this message will generate some discussion around the issue, so that a clearer picture of what people want for Find & Replace and how it could work. Maybe my macro could be a starting point for discussing some alternatives. Then maybe I (if I can find the time) or someone else can implement a well thought out and discussed improvement. Thanks, Ian On Tue, 2005-12-20 at 13:36 +0000, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > In the "Find and Replace" function, there is no way to replace > paragraph breaks. I know you can do the remove paragraph marks from > one-line paragraphs in the Autocorrect feature, but that is not what I > mean. > > Often, I find myself working with documents that have extra line > spacing below the paragraph in place of Twp paragraph marks. This is > not suitable for posting to many web sites or bulletin boards, wheer > double line feeds are required. > > In Word, WordPerfect, Appleworks, etc. it is possible to replace > single paragraph marks with double ones in the "Find and Replace" > feature. For OpenOffice to be "ready for prime time" basic features > such as this need to be available. In fact, one should be able to do > this with all formatting characters. For example, manual like breaks > often have to be either deleted en mass or replaced with paragraph > marks. Neither of these is possible in OpenOffice. > > As a professional writer and editor, I need these features and cannot > work effectively without them. > > Thanks, > > James E. Smith > João Pessoa, Brazil --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
