MS office & Open office compatibility issue

[Howard Gibson]

On Mon, 3 Mar 2008 19:40:25 +0300
"William Muriithi" <william.muriithi-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:

> Hi Gibson,
> >    Open Office spaces lines further apart than Microsoft Word does.
> >
> >    Instead of setting large, bold fonts, use the headers from the stylesheet, than attach a table of contents.  Tell the MS Word user to right click, then update.  Don't tell them how many pages you are sending.
> 
> Do you mind explaining the second paragraph further. I am really
> interested in it, but don't seem to understand it in its present form.

William,

   Microsoft Word and Open Office both use stylesheets for formatting.  Stylesheet are counterintuitive, and most people do not seem to understand them.  This makes Microsoft Word and Open Office quite a bit more obtuse than WordPerfect, which embeds formatting codes in the text.  

   Stylesheets are a powerful formatting tool once you understand them. 

   On either word processor, there is a toobar that lets you select a style for your current paragraph.  On my blank Open Office document, the toolbar says "Default".  If I pull the bar down, I see a selection of headings, plus some formats called "Text body...".  If I explore it, I will find all sorts of other stuff.

   This is all much like stylesheets on the web.

Example:

   You have created a document with sections written by different authors.  You create a style called "Author", and you use this to type in the author's names.  From the style editor, you can simultaneously control for the format of each author entry, including the font, justifications, and staying connected to the next paragaph when the page wraps.  

   You need to play with it a bit to really understand it. 

-- 
Howard Gibson 
hgibson-MwcKTmeKVNQ at public.gmane.org
howardg-PadmjKOQAFn3fQ9qLvQP4Q at public.gmane.org 
http://home.eol.ca/~hgibson
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