lesson 2 – formatting text - bvres.orgbvres.org/.../lesson_2_formatting_text.pdf · lesson 2 –...

Lesson 2 – Formatting TextLesson 2 – Formatting Text

LibreOffice Writer display features:LibreOffice Writer display features:To learn how to do more than simple typing and printing requires that you know some basic display features and functions of LibreOffice Writer. Take a few minutes to review the different parts of the LibreOffice Writer display. You can learn a lot about how to use LibreOffice Writer by simply examining the different things that are there to enhance your word processing.

✔ If it is not already on your display, Open the document named My First Document.

To open a document, select the word File from the Menubar, hover over Recent Documents from the pop down menu, then move the mouse pointer and select My First Document from the pop out menu.

Your display should look similar to that shown The next section will describe the different parts of the dis-play. Try to remember the names of the different parts of the display. They will be referred to in future steps.

Titlebar: The top horizontal line on the display is called the Titlebar. This is common to all Windows software. It contains the name of the program window (LibreOffice Writer), and the name of the document file that is active (My First Document.odt).

Menubar:The second horizontal line on the display is the Menubar. If you position the mouse pointer on a word on the Menubar and click the left mouse button once, a list of menu choices will pop down. This provides access to various program tools. These will be discussed as they are needed.


Standard Toolbar: The third horizontal line is the Standard Toolbar. If you position the mouse pointer over a tool and hover there for a bit, a Tool Tip will appear for a short time. The Tool Tip provides a hint as to what the tool is for.

Text Format Toolbar: The fourth horizontal line on the display is the Text Format Toolbar. This is used to control the font style and position for text.

Page Boundary: The white rectangle shows the Page Boundary. The gray lines surrounding the text show the page MARGINS.

Before messing with the appearance of the document, we need to review some of the basic differences between typewriters and word processors. The characters on typewriters are all exactly the same width on a page. In reality, different characters should have different widths to look their best on the page. In the old days this was done by typesetters who picked letters out of a box and lined them up in a printing press to form words. This was a very time-consuming process, but it allowed for better-looking print. Typewriters had to make all letters be the same width. Word processing software replaces the old slow typesetter and the limited typewriter.

Word processors use what are called proportional fonts. This means that a w is not the same width as an i. This is where experienced typists can get frustrated with word processing. With the typewriter you could line up columns of text by using spaces or tabs. The same number of spaces always aligned nicely with a similar number of characters because on a typewriter all characters are the same width.

Proportional Fonts: In word processing, different characters, or letters, have different widths. The set of characters that have different widths are referred to as Proportional Fonts.

With word processors, we do not rely on spaces to align things since a space character is not the same width as all of the other characters. If this idea bothers you, don't despair. Formatting text with a word processor will give you power and speed beyond the wildest dreams of an experienced typist. One nice thing is you no longer need a bottle of white out to fix typos. Editing on the display will save lots of typewriter paper. You do have to learn some basic tricks. One trick you need to know is how to move the cursor around the docu-ment without using the mouse.

Moving the Text Cursor:Moving the Text Cursor:

Text Cursor: The Text Cursor is a flashing vertical line somewhere in the body of the text. The cursor control keys are the 4 arrow keys to the right of the main part of most keyboards.

✔ Observe the location of the Text Cursor.

✔ Press the different cursor control keys on the keyboard and watch how the Text Cursor moves around.

✔ Practice using the cursor control keys until you can position the text cursor exactly where you want it.

Most people can position the Text Cursor more precisely using the cursor control keys than they can using the mouse.

Moving the Text Cursor:Moving the Text Cursor:

Here is a trick for jumping to the beginning or end of a line. Note that there are keys just above the cursor control keys that are marked Home and End.

✔ Position the Text Cursor on a line somewhere in the middle of the document.

✔ Press the Home key and watch the Text Cursor jump to the beginning of the line.

✔ Press the End key and watch the Text Cursor jump to the end of the line.

A combination key press will jump to the beginning or end of the document.✔ To jump to the beginning of a document, Hold the Ctrl key down and, while holding it

down, press the Home key. (In the future this will be stated press Ctrl+Home.

✔ To jump to the end of a document, press Ctrl+End.

By now you probably have noticed that the mouse pointer changes shape as you move it over different areas of the computer display. When you move the mouse pointer over areas outside of the text on the display it has the shape of a pointer, while when it is over the text in a document it changes to an I. The I shape helps you select a precise location for the Text Cursor.You can also use the mouse to control the Text Cursor location.

✔ Move the mouse pointer to a new location in the text and click the left mouse button once to place the Text Cursor at that location.

✔ Practice positioning the Text Cursor using the mouse.

Selecting text:Selecting text:Text that is currently selected will be highlighted.Editing text requires that you be able to accurately select the part of the text to be edited. There are several selection tricks available for use. The first set of these selection tricks requires a bit of mouse button click-ing dexterity.

✔ To select a single word, position the Text Cursor somewhere in the word and double click. (Double click means to quickly click the left mouse button twice.)

✔ Practice selecting words until you can do it easily.

✔ To select a complete sentence, position the mouse pointer somewhere in the sentence and triple click. (Triple click means to quickly click the left mouse button three times.)

✔ Practice selecting sentences until you can do it easily.

✔ To select a complete paragraph, position the mouse pointer somewhere in the paragraph and quadruple click. (Quadruple click means to quickly click the left mouse button four times.)

✔ Practice selecting paragraphs until you can do it easily.

✔ To make an extended text selection use the shift click option. (Shift click means to position the Text Cursor at the beginning point of the selection, hold the shift key down, and while holding the shift key down move the mouse pointer to the end of the selection and click the left mouse button once.)


✔ Practice using the shift click option until you can accurately select text.

You can also select text by clicking and dragging. This means to position the mouse pointer at the beginning point of the selection, click and hold the left mouse button down, and move the mouse pointer to the end of the desired selection. The problem with clicking and dragging is that it is easy to drag selected text to a new location by mistake.

✔ To de-select text, move the mouse pointer to an unselected location and click the left mouse button once.

Here is one last text selection trick. ✔ To select all of the text in a document, press Ctrl+A.

Ctrl+A means to hold the Ctrl key down and, while holding it down, press the A key.✔ Practice selecting all text until it is easy to do.

✔ Go back and review and practice the different methods for selecting text.

Non-printing characters:Non-printing characters:In computer slanguage, characters include the alphabet, numbers, punctuation marks, and so on. There are also several characters that do not appear when printed. When you press keys like Enter, the Space Bar, and the Tab key, you are actually adding more characters to the document. It is very helpful to be able to see these non-printing characters on the display because they show ex-actly how a document is formatted. The illustration in the adjacent frame shows the sym-bols for 3 non-printing characters, 3 Tab key presses, 10 Spaces, and 6 Enter key presses. There is a tool to use that toggles the display of non-printing charac-ters on and off.

✔ From the Standard Toolbar, select the Nonprinting Characters tool.

The Non-printing Characters tool is a toggle. This means that each time it is selected it switches between on and off.When the Non-printing Characters tool is on, the non-printing characters appear on the display.

Non-printing characters

Non-printing characters:Non-printing characters:

Many beginners find the display of non-printing characters a bit annoying. However, I do not like to work with it off, because I cannot see how things are formatted. If you want to see how your document looks without showing the non-printing characters, select the Page Preview tool.

The Undo tool:The Undo tool:This is a good time to mention the Undo tool found on the Toolbar. Whenever you do one or more things that you wish you had not done, worry not! Just select the Undo tool one or more times to return to the pre-vious state of your document.

There is also a Redo tool (just to the right of the Undo tool) in case you Undo too much.

Formatting text:Formatting text:When you first start a new document in LibreOffice Writer it uses what are called default settings. There are three different settings in use whenever you add text to a document: Paragraph style, Font type, and char-acter Size. The settings used for My First Document were the Default paragraph style, the Times Ro-man font type, and 12 point type size. The currently active settings are shown on the left side of the Format Toolbar.

Observe that the right sides of the three format options shown have a tiny down pointing arrow. When this arrow is selected, a pop down window will show additional choices.


Remember that a paragraph in word processing can be several sentences, a single sentence, a single word, or no words at all. Every paragraph in an LibreOffice Writer document has a paragraph style. Let's change the paragraph style used in My First Document.

Changing the paragraph style:Changing the paragraph style:Note the illustration following the next several steps.

✔ With My First Document on the display, press Ctrl+A to select all of the text.

✔ Select the small arrow to the right of the paragraph section of the Format Toolbar.

✔ Select Text Body from the pop down menu.

✔ Move the mouse pointer to outside the text body and click the left mouse button once to de-select the text.

Observe that there is now extra space between paragraphs. This is because the Text Body paragraph style commands the computer to place a specific amount of space after each paragraph. Typist used multiple carriage returns to put space between lines and paragraphs. This is not necessary, or desirable, when using word processing software. If you want to change spacing, there are ways to change spacing for an entire document with a couple of clicks. These tricks will be covered in a future lesson.

Next, the font style will be changed on some text. Do you remember how to select text? If not, you should have to go back and review the section on Selecting Text.

Bold, Italic, and Underline:Bold, Italic, and Underline:✔ In the first paragraph, select the words LibreOffice Writer.

Bold, Italic, and Underline:Bold, Italic, and Underline:

✔ In the Format Toolbar, select the Bold tool.

Note the the Bold tool is a toggle. Each time you select it the selected text will switch between bold and normal.

NOTE: when the settings in the Text Formatting Toolbar are changed, the change will only apply to text that is currently selected or to text that is added at the current cursor location after the change is made.

Just to the right of the Bold tool in the Format Toolbar, you will find the Italic and Underline tools. These tools are also toggles.

✔ In the first paragraph, select the words enter key.

✔ In the Format Toolbar, select the Bold and Italic tools.

✔ With the words enter key still selected, select from the Menubar, Format, Change Case, Uppercase.

Observe that there are 5 Change Case options in LibreOffice Writer. These operate on currently selected text. If (like me) you accidentally hit the Caps Lock key and then type for a while before you notice, the Format, Change Case tool will enable you to fix an entire selection without the need to delete and retype.

Indenting Paragraphs:Indenting Paragraphs:In the next step, you will see how to indent an entire paragraph in once step.

✔ With the Text Cursor anywhere in the second paragraph, select the Increase Indent tool


Note that each time you select the Increase Indent tool, the amount the current paragraph is indented will increase. Also there is a Decrease Indent tool that removes the indent.

Changing font style and size:Changing font style and size:✔ Press Ctrl+Home to move the cursor to the beginning of the first paragraph, and then press the

Enter key to add a new paragraph before the current first paragraph.

✔ Press Ctrl+Home to move the cursor to the beginning of the new paragraph and type My Document Title.

✔ Select the My Document Title text.

✔ With the My Document Title text selected, make the My Document Title text Bold.

✔ With the My Document Title text selected, change the font style to Ariel.

✔ With the My Document Title text selected, change the font size to 18.

Aligning paragraphs:Aligning paragraphs:✔ With the text cursor in the title paragraph, select the Centered tool from the Format Toolbar.

The selected words should now be centered in your document.

Aligning paragraphs:Aligning paragraphs:

✔ Move the mouse pointer over the 4 different alignment tools and note the Tool Tips show Aligned Left, Centered, Aligned Right and Justified. The Justified option makes both the left and right sides of the paragraph line up with the margins. (Try to do that with your old typewriter!)

Font color, highlighting, andFont color, highlighting, and background color:background color:

Next, the rightmost three tools on the Format Toolbar will be explored. The Font Color, Highlighting, and Background tools are on the right side of the of the Format Toolbar.

✔ With the words My First Document Title selected, select the small down pointing arrow on the right edge of the Font Color tool and change the color to Light Red.

✔ In the last paragraph, select the words There are a number of ways to move the Text Cursor. Then select the small down pointing arrow on the right edge of the Highlighting tool and change the color to Pale Yellow.

This paragraph is aligned left.This paragraph is aligned center.

This paragraph is aligned right.This paragraph is justified. Observe that justified paragraphs have both the left and right sides aligned to the edges of the page. The jus-tified alignment makes for a neat appearance. However, for narrow columns of text or for large font sizes, the spacing between the words may appear unnatural. This is because the system adjusts word spa-cing so that both sides will be aligned.


✔ Place the Text Cursor anywhere in the first (title) paragraph, then select the small down pointing arrow on the right edge of the Background tool and change the color to Blue 8.

Next, several new paragraphs will be ad-ded to demonstrate some more format-ting options.

Bullets and lists:Bullets and lists:✔ Press Ctrl+End to move the Text Cursor to the end of the document.

✔ Press the Enter key to start a new paragraph.

✔ With the Text Cursor in the last (empty) paragraph, enter the words This paragraph uses bullets.

✔ From the Format Toolbar, and with the Text Cursor at the end of the This paragraph uses bullets paragraph, select the Bullets On/Off tool.

✔ Press the Enter key and add a new paragraph with the words This paragraph also uses bullets.

✔ Press the Enter key twice.

Bullets and lists:Bullets and lists:

Observe that when you press the enter key to end a paragraph with bullets, the following paragraph will also have bullets. If you press the enter key again without adding text, the paragraph style will revert to no bul-lets. Also, the Bullets tool is a toggle. If you select it with the cursor in a paragraph that has bullets, the bul-lets will be turned off.

Numbered ListsNumbered ListsThe last formatting to be applied will demonstrate a numbered list.

✔ With the Text Cursor on the last line of your document, enter the word One and then select the Numbering On/Off tool from the Format Toolbar.

✔ Press the Enter key and type List again followed by the Enter key.

✔ Type Another list paragraph, Enter, Maybe this is not in the list, Enter, This is in the list, Enter, Enter.

You should now have a list numbered from 1 through 5. Next, one of the lines will have the list number turned off.

✔ Move the Text Cursor to the line that has the text Maybe this is not in the list.

✔ Select the Numbering On/Off tool from the Format Toolbar.

Your document should now appear similar to the following illustration.


You should get into the habit of saving your document often.✔ From the Standard Toolbar, select the Save tool.

Note that when you have saved a document, the Save tool will become gray and ghosted until you make new changes to the document. This provides a visual clue as to whether you have saved the current version.This completes a tour of the Format Toolbar.

✔ You should Select File New, Text Document from the Menubar, create a new text document of your own, and practice the various formatting options.

Points to remember:Points to remember:

• White-out is a thing of the past. Don't worry about typing precisely the first time. Get the content down while the thoughts are fresh and then edit any typos later.

• Word processors use proportional fonts. This means that you cannot rely on typing spaces to align things. Use paragraph styles to control text formatting.

• If you want to align rows and columns of text (such as a price list for example), you should use a table (discussed in a later lesson) that will keep things aligned for you.

• This paragraph uses bullets, but it also uses something called a hanging indent. That means that lines

Points to remember:Points to remember:

in the paragraph after the first line are indented more than the first line. This is an extra sentence to add more to this paragraph example. Creating custom paragraph styles will be covered in a later chapter.

• Let LibreOffice Writer take care of spacing for you. Paragraph styles automatically include the amount of space before, after, above, and below, paragraphs and the space between lines within paragraphs.

• You should enter all of the text first into your documents and worry about style and appearance after you have the words in place.

• Use the cursor control keys to move the text cursor precisely around the document.

• Press End to jump to the end of a line.• Press Ctrl+End to jump to the end of a document.• Press Home to jump to the beginning of a line.• Press Ctrl+Home to jump to the beginning of a document.• Double click on a word to select the word.• Triple click to select a complete sentence.• Quadruple click to select a complete paragraph.• Toggle the Non-printing Character tool on the Toolbar to reveal the location of spaces, tabs,

and enter key presses.• Use the Text Format Toolbar to control font styles and placement.• Use the Text Format Toolbar to control font color, highlighting, and background color.• Use the Undo tool to fix a mistake.