By A Web Design

Formatting Pages In A Writer Document

Most of Writer’s essential layout settings are collected in the Page dialog box. This controls the appearance of each page of the entire document, which includes printer orientation, margins and page layouts for single and multiple-page documents, as well as numbering and paper format.

Adding Headers and Footers:

Sometimes it is necessary to put vital information about the document either at the top of the page (header information) or at the bottom of the page (footer information), or a combination of both. You can easily enter things such as document title, page numbers, creation date, author, copyright and so on. at the top or bottom of your document body, if you place them in a header or footer outside of the document body; it is assured that this information will always retain the correct placement, irrespective the editing content of the document.

Headers get displayed at the top while footers at the bottom of a document. Headers and footers can either be identical or different. The following simple steps, as shown in Diagram 1 add a header and footer to the document.

Select Insert --> Header --> Default to add a header to a page
Select Insert --> Footer --> Default to add a footer to a page

Diagram 1

Another approach, to add a header and footer to a document is to:

Select Format --> Page from the menu as shown in Diagram 2.
Click the Header or Footer tab as shown in Diagram 3 and Diagram 4.
Select Header on or Footer on

Diagram 2

To change the margins and spacing settings, select the options from the drop down list box of left margin, right margin and spacing respectively as shown in Diagram 3.

Diagram 3

To change the height of the header and footer, select the checkbox of the AutoFit Height which automatically adjusts the height according to the text inside the header or footer. You can manually adjust the height by selecting the options from the drop down list box as shown in Diagram 4.

Diagram 4

Clear the Same content left/right check box if different headers and footers are required for even and odd pages as shown in Diagram 5.

Diagram 5

To use different headers or footers in the document, just add them to different Page Styles and then apply the styles to the pages where the headers or footers must appear.

Inserting Page Numbers in Footers

In order to insert page number at the footer section of the document:

Select the footer section of the document
Select Insert --> Fields --> Page Number as shown in Diagram 6.

If required align the Page Number as the text is aligned

Diagram 6

Inserting Page Count in Footers

A page count can also be added to the footer as shown in Diagram 7:

Click in front of the Page Number field and type "Page ", click after the field, Enter a space and then type "of"
Select --> Fields --> Page Count

The page count display the page number with respect to total number of pages, For Example "Page 1 of 3".

Diagram 7

Inserting a Chapter Name and Number in a Header or Footer

Before inserting chapter information into a header or footer, first set the outline numbering options for the paragraph style that has to be used for chapter titles.

To create a paragraph style for chapter titles, Select Tools --> Outline Numbering as shown in Diagram 8.

Diagram 8

In the Paragraph Style box select the paragraph style that has to be used for chapter titles. For example: "Heading 1" as shown in Diagram 9.
Select the numbering style for the chapter titles in the Number box.
For example: "1, 2, 3..."
Type "Chapter" followed by a space in the Before box
Enter a space in the After box

Diagram 9

The steps to insert the chapter name and number in a header or footer:

Apply the paragraph style that is defined for chapter titles to the chapter headings in the document
Select the header or footer
Select Insert --> Fields --> Other as shown in Diagram 10.

Diagram 10

Click the Document tab
Click "Chapter" in the Type list and "Chapter number and name" in the Format list as shown in Diagram 11
Click Insert and then click Close

Diagram 11

The header on every page that uses the current page style automatically displays the chapter name and number as shown in Diagram 12. Other fields can also be inserted in the header or footer, such as Date, Time, Page Number, Page Count, Subject, Title and Author.

Diagram 12

Setting Margins:

In order to set margins, Select Format --> Page from the menu.

Using the Page tab on the Page dialog box as shown in Diagram 13, the document’s margins, size, orientation, layout and page numbering format can be set.

In the Paper Format area select a paper format that matches the paper size in the printer’s paper tray. If the printer is a multi tray printer, then select the proper tray required from the Paper Tray drop down list or accept the Default from Printer Settings. The Width and Height boxes display the dimensions of the current selection. As soon as typing is started in either box, Writer changes the Paper Format setting to User, indicating that a custom format is being defined. Text documents typically use the Portrait Orientation by default. However, if the document consists of multi columns, tables or charts then Landscape may be considered so that the columns and cells do not end up being too narrow.

In the Margins area, enter a numeric value to specify the distance between the top and bottom margins of the page. Enter a numeric value to specify the distance between the right and left edges of the page if required.

In the Layout Settings, all those pages whose formatting will be affected can be selected. The page numbers can also be specified in the Format box so that Writer will use them to keep track of the pages being specially formatted, if there are page numbers in the header or footer regions of the document.

Diagram 13

Inserting Manual Breaks:

Writer inserts a manual line break, column break or a page break at the current cursor position.
For manual breaks select Insert --> Manual Break as shown in Diagram 14 an Insert Break dialog box is displayed.

Diagram 14

There are three types of Manual Breaks as shown in Diagram 15:

Line Break – It ends the current line and moves the text found to the right of the cursor to the next line without creating a new paragraph. Line break can also be inserted by pressing Shift + Enter.
Column Break – It moves the text found to the right of the cursor to the beginning of the next column. A Column break is inserted in a multiple column layout. It is indicated by a non printing border at the top of the new column.
Page Break – It moves the text found to the right of the cursor to the beginning of the next page. The inserted page break is indicated by a non printing border at the top of the new page. A Page break can also be inserted by pressing Ctrl + Enter.

Diagram 15