Editing Default Styles and Using Templates

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Both OpenOffice.org and NeoOffice save styles in individual documents, and any modification of them (or the default document style) is only saved in the document that is active when editing the styles. This is highly impractical for those who want to develop their own consistent look and feel.

The following instructions apply equally to NeoOffice and OpenOffice.org

Contents

Setting the Default Style, Layout and Styles Available in New Documents

To install a standard style for every new document, you should create and save a template for each component of NeoOffice (NeoWriter, NeoCalc and NeoImpress) that you intend to use.

These templates should contain all of the defaults that you want, such as:

  • Default fonts
  • Margins
  • Page sizes/orientations
  • Styles
  • Languages
  • Any required metadata (File -> Properties)
  • etc.

You can easily build a template by opening a new document and setting all the defaults you want.

For default fonts, be sure to set the font in the Default style (open the Stylist—choose Styles and Formatting from the Format menu, or use the toolbar button—then right-click "Default" in the list of styles and choose Modify… from the context menu), from which nearly all other styles are derived.

See Creating Calc Templates and this post on trinity for a set-by-step explanation for Calc.

Saving the Template

You should then save the it using the item in the Template sub-menu: in the File menu, select Templates and then Save. It should now be located in this folder on your disk: ~/Library/Preferences/NeoOffice-2.1/user/template/
(for NeoOffice 2.0 Aqua Beta, ~/Library/Preferences/NeoOffice-2.x/user/template/).

Note that you cannot save templates to the "Presentations" or "Presentation Backgrounds" categories that come "prepackaged" with NeoOffice. You can only add templates to "My Templates" or a category you create.

Setting a Template as the Default Template for a Component

Once you have saved your template, do the following:

  • Go to File menu, open the Templates submenu, and select Organize
  • Open the "My Templates" folder in the left part of the window and select the template you want
  • Right-click or control-click or use the Commands button and select Use as default template

Using Templates in Other Locations

You can also use files located in other folders or drives if you select File -> Templates -> Organize and use the 'File' button. This enables you to share templates stored on a central server.

The advantage of using templates in NeoOffice and OpenOffice.org is that you will be notified when a template that you have based a document on has been changed. You will be asked if you want to update the document to the new template. If you approve, the new settings will be applied immediately.

Note: if you do not update a document based on a changed template, the link between the document and template will be broken and you will never be asked again.

Also note that NeoOffice will not ask you to save templates after editing any document, so you do not run the risk of changing your default templates as with Microsoft Word. You must deliberately edit a template to update it.

Importing Templates

If you have downloaded templates or are moving templates from another computer, you either of these two methods ti import them:

Method One:

  1. Quit NeoOffice if it is running
  2. Move the files to ~/Library/Preferences/NeoOffice-2.2/user/template/
    1. If you have sub folders in the "template" folder, you can also move the template files to these folders, and they should appear in the Organize dialog box in the appropriate folder.
  3. Open NeoOffice, click on the File menu, choose Templates and Organize
  4. Double click on the folder "My Templates" and make sure that the templates appear

Method Two:

  1. In NeoOffice, under the File menu, move down to Templates and select Organize.
  2. If necessary, create a new folder or folders for your templates.
  3. Select the folder/category you want the tempates to be imported into
    1. Note that you cannot import templates into "Presentations" or "Presentation Backgrounds"
  4. Click on Commands and chose Import...
  5. A typical Mac Open dialog box appears. Navigate to the location of your templates and select the template or templates you want to import. (You can select more than one template at a time as long as they are in the same location)

Using Microsoft Office Templates

To Add Microsoft Office templates in to NeoOffice's collection of templates:

  1. Open an Office template in NeoOffice
  2. Under the File Menu, select Templates and then Save.
  3. In the resulting dialog box, select the category (folder) you want, and give the template a name.
    • To create a new category, click on the "Commands" button and choose "New" Give the new category a name


If you have lots of Office Templates, you can:

  1. Go under the File menu to Wizards and choose Document Converter.
  2. Walk through the steps in the wizard, and it will convert your Office documents to Open Document formats.
  3. Return to the File menu to Templates and select Organize. Choose the category (folder) you want
    • You can create a new folder by pressing the "Commands button" and choosing "New.")
  4. Press the "Commands button" and choose "Import template"
    • Note that you must have selected a folder in order for this option to show up.
  5. Navigate to the converted templates you want to add to the organizer, and click "save."
  6. Repeat these last two steps until all of your templates are added.


Note that you cannot add templates to the "Presentations" or "Presentation Backgrounds" categories that come "prepackaged" with NeoOffice. You can only add templates to "My Templates" or a category you create.

Resources for Styles and Templates

The following are a collection of sources to help you use styles, clipart, and templates in NeoOffice and OpenOffice.org, including links to collections of templates and clipart.

Documentation and tips on using styles

Sources of document templates

Also check the component pages (NeoWriter, NeoCalc, NeoBase, NeoImpress, and NeoDraw) for templates specific to those components. Bruce Byfield has a good article "reviewing" some of these template sites in detail.

Label and Impress templates are available from the top page. Templates for other modules are sorted by language (Czech, English, French, German and Italian).
CD labels, CD Envelope, and Initial Dialog Template and Macros for creating standard forms where the user is prompted for certain information upon opening, e.g. an address.
Templates packaged as extensions.

Sources of clipart

Please see the Using Clipart article for information about obtaining and using clipart with NeoOffice.


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