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Format menu

The Format menu contains commands that allow you to control the formatting of the document, for example the number of columns, position of headings, date formats, borders and style attributes of text and graphics.

Change...

The Change... command is used to apply changes to the formatting attributes specific to the type of the currently selected structure. It leads to a dialogue box where the following attributes can be set.

Document, Chapter and Section

The Document, Chapter and Section format dialogue boxes are almost identical:

They allow you to:

List

The List Format dialogue box is where you set the properties of a list.

Table

The Table dialogue box is where you set the properties of a table.

Figure

The Figure Format dialogue box is where you control the position of a figures caption.

Picture

The Picture Format dialogue box lets you control the scale and cropping of a picture.

You can:

Save Style Changes

This command is used either to apply formatting changes made to the current selection to all the other structures using the same style, or to create a new style.

You can also access the Save Style changes dialogue by clicking Adjust on the Style indicator button.

<Structure> styles

This command changes name depending on which type of structure is selected. It leads to a submenu containing the list of styles defined for that type. Choosing a style from the list will cause the selection to be reformatted in accordance with that style definition.

Each structure type has a default style which appears at the top of the list. User defined styles are appended below it.

This menu can also be opened by clicking Menu on the Style indicator button.

Auto hyphenation

The Auto hyphenation command turns hyphenation on, or off, for the paragraph containing the caret. To hyphenate the entire document choose Document from the Select menu then choose Auto hyphenation. When hyphenation is on, a tick will appear to the left of the menu item.

The last word of a paragraph will not be hyphenated.

EasiWriter can hyphenate in most of the European languages. Use the Country command from the Text menu to choose the language to be used by the hyphenation routines on individual words, phrases, sentences, structures or the entire document. German words containing 'ck' will be hyphenated as 'k-k'.

For example the German for printer - Drucker becomes Drucker the first 'c' changing to a 'k'.

Spacing

Lets you change the space before and after the selected structure.

Where appropriate it also lets you adjust the spacing between lines of text.
Normally EasiWriter adjusts the height of lines to accommodate the tallest item in the line, for example a picture or some text in a larger size than the paragraph text.

Space before and after

Space before Chapters and Sections is suppressed at the top of pages on all but the first page. Similarly Space after is ignored at the bottoms of pages.

Note: Space before a Chapter or Section heading is included as space within the Chapter or Section and would not be suppressed.

Borders

The Borders command leads to a dialogue box.

Alignment

The Alignment command allows you to choose between Left, Centre, Right and Full justification - equivalent to clicking the justification icons on the ruler.

There is another command Force full which behaves like 'Full justify', except that the last line of the paragraph, or line breaks forced using Shift-Return, are also justified. Normally this is not good typographic practice, but there are some cases where it can be useful.

For example, forcing justification of the last line can be useful when you are using a figure to include a diagram, or other illustration, within fully justified text. This text at the side of the

picture is actually a section of two paragraphs and no heading, within a figure caption.

The caption is placed at the right of the diagram by selecting the figure, and using the Change command.

picture is actually a section of two paragraphs and no heading, within a figure caption.

The caption is placed at the right of the diagram by selecting the figure, and using the Change command.

In this example there are four paragraphs, the first (ending 'side of the') has forced full justification, so that it appears to flow round the diagram.

As a tool bar short-cut, Force full justification can be applied by clicking on the Full (rightmost) justification button with Adjust.

Tab

The Tab command leads to a submenu offering the following choices:

Info

Info leads to a dialogue box where you can:

Add

Allows you to add a new tab to the ruler.

Move

Enables you to move the selected tab or tabs. Note: the selection does not have to be contiguous.

Delete

Allows you to remove the selected tab(s) from the ruler.

Insert break

Leads to a submenu with the following choices:

Page break

Starts a new page at the end of the paragraph containing the caret.

Note: Start new page can also be included as a property of a Chapter or Section style.

Column break

Starts a new column at the end of the paragraph containing the caret.

White space

Inserts an empty structure that can be stretched vertically using the mouse. The minimum size is four points.

Page filler

Inserts an empty structure that automatically extends itself to the bottom of the page. This can be used to force vertical rules to extend to the full extent of the page.

Start <Structure> page

If the start of the selection is in a chapter or structure within a chapter it leads to a dialogue box where you can set the start page number for the chapter. If the selection is at the document level it starts the numbering sequence for the document.

Set date format

The Set date format dialogue box allows you to choose the format that EasiWriter will use to display dates and times that have been inserted into the document using the Insert command from the Structure menu. In addition to the built in date formats, you can create your own by mixing date fields with text.

For example:

%WE the %ZDY%ST of %MO = Monday the 2nd of February

Name Value Example
%se seconds 59
%mi minutes 05
%12 hours in 12 hour format 07
%24 hours in 24 hour format 23
%am or %pm 'AM' or 'PM' am
%we weekday in full Thursday
%w3 weekday, in three characters Thu
%wn weekday, as a number 5
%dy day of the month 01
%st 'st', 'nd', 'rd', 'th' st
%mo month in full September
%m3 month in three characters Sep
%mn month as number 09
%ce century 19
%yr year within century 97
%wk week of the year, Mon to Sun 52
%dn day of the year 366
%tz time zone BST
%% insert a %
To remove leading zeros, prefix the code with a 'Z' i.e.
%zdy day of the month (suppress zero) 1

Plain text can also be included in the variable string; for example:

%we the %sy%st of %mo3 %ce%yr

would display in the form: Wednesday the 22nd of January 2000

To avoid the problem of changing the date in, for example, a letter when you open it at a later date Always update date and time works in a special ways
If you start a new document from a stationery pad the date will be updated when you create the document after which it will not be changed. This does not apply to dates in Headers and footers.


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