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 these attributes can be set.

Document, Chapter and Section

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

They allow you to:

• Choose the Heading position - None, In columns, Above columns and Hanging.
• Choose up to 9 columns, balance their contents so that all columns are the same length, vertically justify them and choose between a variety of separation rules.
• Start Chapters and Sections immediately or on the next page and start chapters on left or right hand pages.
• Suppress Paragraph indentation after Headings and change the numbering system used in Headers and Footers.
• You can also number Chapters and Sections.

List

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

• You can choose the font and character used for the bullet.
• The bullet character can also be deleted if you want to type your own character at the beginning of each list item, or leave it blank.
• Choose Auto indent to have a tab character inserted after the bullet.
• You can also auto number lists.

Table

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

• Tables can be made to stay on the same page or in the same column.
• You can choose fixed width columns, which will word wrap, by turning off Automatic column widths.

Figure

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

• Figures can have their captions above, below, left or right.

Picture

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

You can:

• Choose a scaling factor for the picture between 10% and 999% independently in both the axis and axis.
• Crop pictures by typing a value in the top, bottom, left or right writable icons.
• Move the picture frame out from the picture by typing a negative value in the top, bottom, left or right writable icons.
• Change the unit of measurement by clicking on it.
• Double-clicking on a picture will also open the Picture Format dialogue box.

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.

• If style changes are made and saved with the same name then everything in the document that uses that style will change to the new definition.
• If style changes are made and saved with a different name a new style is created which may be applied to other structures to make them the same.

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 selected text. 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.

Click Custom to change the default line height. Double the existing value for double line spacing.

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. Click Fixed to fix the height of the line to the line height of the paragraph shown in the dialogue box.

Borders

The Borders command leads to a dialogue box.

• You can apply borders to the top, bottom, left & right of the currently selected structure.
• Vary the line type and thickness.
• Have a shadow effect
• You can apply a background colour and merge adjacent borders if, for example, you want to put a border around a group of consecutive paragraphs.

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.

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') and the third (ending 'Change command.') have forced full justification, so that they appear 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:

• Change the type, position and units of measurement of a selected tab.
• Edit (or add) the tab filler characters associated with a tab - up to four characters.
• For decimal tabs only - change the decimal separator character. Normally '.' or ',' but can be any character you choose.

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.

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
%AM or %PM	'AM' or 'PM'	am
%WE	weekday in full	Thursday
%W3	weekday in three characters	Thu
%DY	day of the month	01
%ZDY	day of the month (suppress zero)	1
%MO	month in full	September
%M3	month in three characters	Sep
%MN	month as number	09
%ST	'st', 'nd', 'rd', 'th'	st
%CE	century	19
%YE	year within century	97

A full description of how to use the date and time fields can be found in the RISC OS User guide in the section system variables.