Description: The only way I can find to create a paragraph style that contains text as an area is to use an external program to convert the text to an image and then import it into the styles Area tab. This is awkward, especially if all I want is a single character in a specific dingbat font. It would be nice to have fields in the Area -> Bitmap dialogue that would allow a short piece of text, a font, and a name to be specified. A Create button would then convert the text to the desired font (preferably as an SVG, which would eliminate the need for a font size option) and save it under the specified name just as it would be with the Import button. The image can then be used like any other image in the bitmap presets. While this might seem like an esoteric feature, it would be incredibly handy when designing books and using dingbats or other characters as markers between scenes and in other design elements. Steps to Reproduce: 2. 3. Actual Results: none Expected Results: Easy inclusion of text characters as a paragraph style in document designs. Reproducible: Always User Profile Reset: No Additional Info:
This really sounds like a job for a 3rd party extension and not something that belongs to the core.
The use case is not clear. Do you want this characters as background with other text in foreground? -> Make a fontwork object and put it background. Or do you want to use it instead of normal text? -> Use the characters directly. Or?
Created attachment 156954 [details] Example of a scene separator An example of a design element that might be created with the proposed feature.
Sorry for the confusion.The attachment shows a typical design element that this feature would make trivial. The current method is to have a paragraph style with enough space above and below to make it exactly 2 lines high. The chain graphic in the middle is actually a character from a dingbat font, and it must be inserted manually for each instance. This method works well, but if the graphic element is to be changed, it must be changed manually for every such paragraph in the document. The proposed enhancement would have the following work flow to create the same effect: 1. Create the new paragraph style (call it Scene Separator). 2. Set the Alignment to centre. 3. In the Area -> Bitmap dialogue select the dingbat font and the text (a letter 'f' in this case). 4. Create the bitmap. 5. Adjust the existing area parameters so that the new bitmap shows up in a pleasing way. Now the Scene Separator can simply be inserted where needed in the document. To change the graphic element, simply modify the paragraph style to create a new bitmap and use it. The ability to enter several characters shouldn't change the required code significantly as the whole string becomes one bitmap.
So your problem is, that you want to use the same scene separator at various places and that there should be an easy way to exchange the characters which build the separator. Using a bitmap seems to be only a workaround. Currently I know these two ways: (A) Write the characters, mark them, and generate a bookmark. Include blanks at start and end, that makes later editing much easier. At all other places, where you want this separator, enter a reference to the bookmark. Use as Insert type "Reference" to get the characters and not e.g. the page number. For to change the separator, edit the bookmark and then use Tools > Update to update the references. You need to style the target paragraph with the same style as the source paragraph manually. Styles are not included in bookmarks. (B) Write the characters, then make a section from that paragraph. At all other places insert a section which is a link to the first generated section. You will find the link option in the section dialog. In this solution the styles are copied too. In theory there exists a solution with frames. The ODF file format allows to define a frame as copy-of of another frame, so that again only one place is used to specify the content. But this feature is not implemented in LibreOffice. It would be the attribute draw:copy-of.
Brain storming a third solution would be to make the line break character freely defined per paragraph. The usual hidden pilcrow is replaced in your case by some other, visible character. Won't be a cross-plattform/application solution. So WF for the request. Another idea that comes in my mind is to work with numbering (tools > chapter numbering). Unfortunately it's not possible to use any character for the numbering but thew workaround is simple. Use "none" for the "number" but have some character "before" or "after".
Taking the proposed solutions in order: From Regina: (A) doesn't preserve the style, so that won't work. (B) mostly works, but linked styles don't seem to work properly. For example, in my publishing template the style after Scene Separator is Scene Start (non-indented paragraph). When I try to use this I get a two-cell table (??) instead of the next paragraph style. From Heiko: This seems to do everything I want, though it's far more complex than my proposal, and, of course, non-obvious to all but experts. Perhaps the UX people need to decide whether adding a more obvious, simpler method to accomplish this will improve the user experience enough to warrant it. My vote is yes. Thank you for your time.