[Solved] Master Document Typesetting

[arunagirinathar]

Hello all,

I am currently typesetting a book with approximately 700 chapters. The whole text runs to approximately 2500 pages or so. To ease editing and typesetting I decided to use One file per chapter and then link the chapter files in a master document.

I am currently using RIght Page & Left page alternatively to stylize headers. And every file starts with a Right Page. I assume that this right-page setting will be over-ridden in the master document. Normally I would have expected, when a new file is inserted, it follow the previous page' style (in this case last page of previous file's style), but this is not the case. So, if the previous page was left, the next page would be right and vice-versa. (In Page styles, I have set Right and Left pages to follow each other). But that is not the case. The sub-document retains it's page styles.

In a nutshell, basically I want the chapters to seamlessly integrate into the master file, which is not happenning. I get blank pages in between etc.

Also is there any way of inserting files in a master document without actually making them start on a new 'print' page.

Or am I doing something wrong ?

Thanks.

[RoryOF]

A Right page is an absolute instruction and leaves no discretion to the Master document. I'll look at your problem later today. As far as I know, there is no way to start a subdocument mid-page.

[floris v]

Everything works as intended. Sub documents keep their page (and other) styles - of course. But the settings in the styles in the master document override the settings in the styles in the sub documents.
A sub document will always start on a new page, you can't avoid that. You can force a chapter to start on a right page by linking the heading 1 paragraph style to the page style Right page in the master document. If a previous chapter ended on a right page, a blank left page will automatically be inserted automatically.
You don't really need Left and Right page styles throughout your document - you can un-tick the Same content on left and right pages option in the Header and Footer tabs of the page style dialog box and customize each header/footer. Then you can use the default page style for ordinary pages and Right page for the first page of a chapter.

[RoryOF]

Floris v seems to have covered everything! Can I take the rest of the day off, floris ?

Unless the text is bulky, say with many inserted illustrations etc, I would prefer to work in one big file; this is very dependant on the speed of your computer, of course. For badness I once tried an OpenOffice Writer file of 22K pages (repeated copies of War and Peace). It was stable but editing it was so slow as to be impracticable. I would think that 2500/3000 pages ought be editable in the one big file, as the process would be mainly review to make sure there were no formatting awkwardnesses.

[Hagar Delest]

A sub document will always start on a new page

Are you sure?

Master.zip

(56.53 KiB) Downloaded 188 times

[floris v]

Well, I thought so. Always nice to find that I'm wrong and that more is possible.

[arunagirinathar]

A sub document will always start on a new page

Are you sure?

The attachment Master.zip is no longer available

@hagar
How did you do this ? I've been trying this all morning. I cound not replicate on my own. No matter what sub-documents start on their own page !?

I am attaching a snippet of the document I am working on.

Any help in this regard would be very helpful.

@floris

Thank you for the suggestion. I did try out and it came out very well indeed!

[acknak]

I think it depends on having the sub-document not changing the page style; Hagar's document files all use the page style named "Default".

That, and each of the subdocuments in your sample contain a page break in the first paragraph.

[Hagar Delest]

Note that I had never noticed (but I don't use master documents) that the page style break information is kept in the master document, which seems rather illogical IMHO. You don't necessarily want to apply the First page style for each start of chapter once collected in the master document.

[arunagirinathar]

Thanks @Hagar and @acknak for your thoughtful insights.

@acknak -
All my sub-documents are now using (also in the sample document) 'Default' page style. I do not understand how a Heading 1 breaks the page (when I have not explicitly set the insert page break in the text flow properties) ? Please explain.

Regarding 'applyin' pagebreaks, I did not do anything - not even change the text flow properties. It would be very helpful to point out where I've gone wrong in inserting explicit (or implicit) page breaks.

[Hagar Delest]

If you've applied once the First page style, your first paragraph got a direct formatting with the page break in fact. So you've to remove it (right click the first paragraph and select the Paragraph entry).

[arunagirinathar]

I've removed first page style, removed all other styles except custom paragraph (verse) styles, still no avail.

[arunagirinathar]

Thanks all

It only struck me after reading this thread
http://user.services.openoffice.org/en/ ... 30&t=33594

that I had to select the 'Paragraph' and not 'Paragraph Style' and then modify the text flow properties, in which LibreOffice had taken the liberty to add 'Page-Breaks'.

Thank you for your patience

[arunagirinathar]

Issue solved.

Just for clarification - If I need explicit page breaks, All I need to do is set it in the text-flow properties ?

Thank you all again

[floris v]

That depends - if you want to insert something like a landscape page, you'll need an explicit manual page break, not linked to a paragraph style. If you always want a page break before a heading, you can add a page break to that heading style.