At 16:03 28/11/2010 +0000, Harold Fuchs wrote:
I've read some of the documentation on Sections in OOo Writer but
I've decided I don't understand the thinking behind them. Perhaps
some would explain it to me:
If I create a new blank Writer document, type a few lines and then
insert a section, a few things are puzzling:
1. The new section is named "section 1". Why not "section 2"? Why
isn't the text *before* the new section considered to be Section 1?
Of course, programmers prefer to count from zero ;-) but the text
above the new section isn't "Section 0" either ...
Because the text before the new section is not a section at all -
just part of the document. You may be thinking in Word-speak, where
a section is actually a section *break*, and all text is (I think) in
sections, divided by these section breaks. In Writer, your newly
inserted section is indeed the first.
2. The text before the new section doesn't seem to belong to any
section. I don't seem to be able to format it like I can the new
section. What is happening here?
You are correct: it is not in a section, so you cannot use any
techniques that apply to sections. But you can apply many formatting
options using paragraph or - more likely - page formatting.
3. When I create the new section, a faint box appears on the screen
and the cursor jumps to a point *below* the bottom of this box. But
where the cursor is doesn't seen to be a section (section 2?) either.
Correct: just like the material before your one and only section,
anything you put here will be outside any section.
4. If I set the Navigator to select Sections then "Next section" and
"Previous section" behave strangely (to my eyes): If the cursor is
*inside* the new section then Next Section and Previous Section do
nothing. If the cursor is in the text above the top (below the
bottom) of the new section then Next (Previous) Section jumps into
the new section. So the cursor can be made to jump into the new
section but not out of it:-(
This all makes sense if you see your document as containing one
section, not three. If you are inside the section, there is no other
section to move to: neither a previous nor a next one. If you are
outside that section, you can indeed move to it as the next or
previous (and only) section, as appropriate.
5. If I new insert a new section *inside* the one I just made then
it is named Section 2 and the old Section 1 seems to have divided
into two - part above and part below the new section. If I format
Section 1 (say by making it into multiple columns) then both
"halves" of the section acquire the new format.
The two sections are nested. Section 1 is indeed divided, and any
formatting applied to it should apply to all of it - both parts, that
is. That's exactly what I would hope and expect.
6. If the cursor is inside Section 2 then Previous Section moves it
into the top half of Section 1 but Next Section does nothing.
Moving to a section appears to mean moving to the beginning of that
section. If you are in Section 2, the beginning of Section 1 is
another section and before it, so it makes sense for Previous Section
to move there. But there is no beginning of a section later than
this, so Next Section has nowhere to go.
I trust this helps.
Brian Barker
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