[tdf-discuss] Re: [libreoffice-design] Templates, styles, outline and bullets/numbering
Hi, Steve! On Sun, 22 May 2011 17:25:09 -0700, Steve Edmonds steve.edmo...@ptglobal.com wrote: The documentation at http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/cgi_img_auth.php/6/6e/0103GS3-StylesAndTemplates.pdf doesn't explain how they work and possibly if I can gain a better understanding I can update the wiki with a view to distilling the information I garner into something simple for the bulk of average users. Page 5 explains pretty much everything, I think. Maybe it is clearer to say it this way: styles set defaults for a kind of paragraph, so you can have all your titles look the same. You apply the paragraph style Heading 1 to all your first-level headings. You can redefine the Heading 1 with different attributes (like bold and some top spacing) and you will see all of them being uniformly updated. If you don't apply any kind of direct formatting, all will look the same. For paragraph attributes (indents, tabs, spacing...) the computed attributes will be those applied by the paragraph style, overridden by whatever direct paragraph formatting (indents, etc.) you apply. For character attributes (bold, font size...) the computed attributes will be those set by the paragraph style, overridden by those set by the character style, and then overridden by whatever direct formatting. Just consider the following: A style will inherit all undefined attributes from its parent style (which, in turn, may inherit attributes from its own parent style, up the way to Default). These are the basics, but should get you started. If you know HTML/CSS, styles are similar to classes. As this ultimately may end up with design consequences, should the discussion be in one list or the other of both? Design, I think. Other people have suggested some ideas. Some good, some not so much. To start with, what is the underlying construction of the document. It would seem that document features have styles associated. Do styles modify the document construction on application (or modification) of the style or do the styles work in layers like a filter. No, it's not that complicated. Paragraph styles are just a collection of formatting attributes (text flow attributes like keep with next are also formatting attributes) that get defined with a name, and then, applied to any paragraph. Some functions may use styles, like, the Table of Contents field will use Contents 1 to N, and hyperlinks will use the Hyperlink style. I.e. a line of text entered initially in a default document has a certain indent. If I adjust the slider on the ruler it changes the indent. If I apply a paragraph style it changes the indent. Does applying the style change the basic indent value or override the basic value. If the style is removed, does the indent revert to the basic value. Two mistakes here. First, there is no basic indent. If you do those steps in order, when you change the paragraph style indent you will not see any different because it is already overridden by whatever value you set by sliding the ruler. Second, styles don't get removed. You are ALWAYS using a style. People who never apply styles will just be overriding the attributes from the Default style all over the document. If I apply a paragraph style and then a list style, do these subsequently override the indent. Are they hierarchical so no matter what later change I make to the paragraph style my override by the last applied list style maintains the indent. I would say that those are not mixed, but I'm not sure about this. Try it for yourself. Hope this helps. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[tdf-discuss] Re: [libreoffice-design] Templates, styles, outline and bullets/numbering
On 30/04/11 4:18 AM, RGB ES wrote: 2011/4/29 Greggreg.lu...@gmail.com: 2011/4/28 Greggreg.lu...@gmail.com: Hi, I believe Writer's template, style, outline and numbering facilities are in need of a rethink. The areas I think are weak, and this is by no means a full list, are: - The template organiser dialogue - who knows how to use it and what it's really for? - Style management - setting defaults, selecting style-sheets with some idea of the stylistic/visual impact, changing styles - Style usage - must become solid, robust and consistent. The impossibility of getting working single type or mixed type (numbered or bulletted) outline lists must be solved! At the moment, there seem to be three or four ways to control list hierarchies and only some (or one) of them work. They are using the tab key, using the increase/decrease indent button, using the list or numbering styles or using the bullets and numbering's outline view. They each break the others in an unpredictable way! I think the user stories that press on the issues are something like: 1/ As a document writer, I want to ensure my document is easy to read because all the paragraphs, headers and lists are consistent in their style and outline level, according to their position in the document hierarchy. You can probably tell from this that I think we should strive to make styles and outline levels so easy to use (while not diminishing their full capabilities) that users predominantly use styles and not the ad-hoc editing methods that render most docs inconsistent and difficult to read. 2/ As a document writer, I want to be able to very easily select a style-sheet to change the look of my document, so I have a good idea of how the new style- sheet will look before I select it and I should not have to do much custom editing to get a style I like. 3/As a style-sheet writer or modifier, I want to see a style-sheet view of the world, that shows the hierarchy of styles and their setting inheritance and overrides, so that I can easily build and maintain a simple and logical style- sheet e.g. style settings inheritance and override hierarchy (This indented text illustrates the hierarchy, not a design ;o) -- Default (All settings, including outline levels) --Paragraph text (overridden or new settings) --Heading (overridden or new settings) --Heading1 (overridden or new settings) --Heading2 (overridden or new settings) --Heading3 (overridden or new settings) --Header (overridden or new settings) --FirstPageHeader (overridden or new settings) --LeftHeader (overridden or new settings) --RightHeader (overridden or new settings) --Footer (overridden or new settings) --FirstPageFooter (overridden or new settings) --LeftFooter (overridden or new settings) --RightFooter (overridden or new settings) --List (overridden or new settings) --BulletList1 (overridden or new settings) --NumberList1 (overridden or new settings) --BulletList2 (overridden or new settings) --NumberList2 (overridden or new settings) --BulletList3 (overridden or new settings) --NumberList3 (overridden or new settings) 4/As a style-sheet writer or modifier, I want to lock a style-sheet to a document template, so that only that style-sheet can be used, so the documents produced are consistent. (personally, I'd like to see a way to lock out custom edits for selected doc templates too, for complete document consistency and compatibility - this is especially powerful for collaboratively authored docs) Aside from the implicated UI redesign, I think an extensive and professional set of style-sheets would greatly help matters. Any thoughts? Cheers, Greg -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted At first I though that when you said style sheets you were talking about templates... but you also use the word template. What do you refer as style sheet? I've never had problems with numbered lists (I mean, once I understood how they work...), but I agree that they are not clear at all. Most users I've seen tend to confuse numbered lists with outline numbering, so a better distinction is needed. Then you can't have pushed them much. As I said before At the moment, there seem to be three or four ways to control list hierarchies and only some (or one) of them work. They are using the tab key, using the increase/decrease indent
