Find & replace attributes not working

Hello Team,

I am reviewing *Writer Chapter 3 Working with Text Advanced*.. Under *Advanced
find and replace techniques --> **Find and replace text attributes and
formatting, *I am unable to search for attributes such as *Font *or *Font
color*. Nothing appears in the *Find *box to select.
For example, following these steps below, no options appear under the *Find*
box to choose from:

   1.

   On the *Find & Replace* dialog (with *Other Options* displayed), click
   the *Attributes* button.
   2.

   Select the attribute you wish to search for from the list in the
   Attributes dialog and click *OK*. The names of the selected attributes
   appear under the *Find:* box. For example, to search for text that has
   been changed from the default font color, select the *Font Color*
   attribute.

I am using LibreOffice Writer version 6.4.2.2 on a Windows 10 PC, Is
anyone else able to get this working?

Thank you!

Kind regards,

Toni

Font, font color and a lot of others can be found by selecting what you
want replaced clicking on the FORMAT button and then selecting the
formatting of the selected text that you are looking for. In the replace
field, enter the text you want to use as the replacement, click FORMAT
and select the formatting you want for that text.

For some reason ATTRIBUTES is only available for the field that you want
replaced--making it rather useless.

Hello Team!

I could use some guidance. I am double checking some things in updating
the Writer Chapter 3 Guide. I can not get the *Find & Replace > Attributes*
option to work at all. Should we report this as a bug? Do we delete this
section from the manual? *Format* works fine. It is just the *Attributes*
search that doesn't work.

Please see the steps in my previous email below. Since the instructions
say the search looks for changes from the default, I changed some of the
font colors but still no options show up in the *Find*: box.

[image: image.png]

Thank you!

Toni

Maybe you are seeing https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=106076

Ilmari

Toni B kirjoitti 21.4.2020 klo 18.42:

Is anyone able to get the attributes search to work?

Hi Toni,

I just looked into the steps you have drafted in your first email, when
looked into online help I found related content in the below link which
might answer your query:
https://help.libreoffice.org/6.4/en-US/text/shared/guide/find_attributes.html?&DbPAR=WRITER&System=WIN

The link says "For example, if you search for the Font attribute, all
instances of text that do not use the default font are found". So I guess
the "Font" function works only to search for the font which doesn't default
in the document. Same with the font color option as well when font color is
changed in the document and the "Find next" option is clicked with the
"Font color" attribute selected, it works. I tried both the options and it
worked for me as per whats mentioned in the link.

Hope my explanation makes sense.

Kind regards
Shravani

Thank you all for the suggestions and research.
Shravani - I do see the behavior you describe and afterward, the text makes
better sense.
As an "end user" I think this behavior is very confusing. I would expect
the Find/Replace to work as described in Find and Replace Paragraph
Styles. I will have to let this sink in and see if I can find a better way
to describe it for those first using it. The expectation of choices
popping up in the Find and the Replace boxes really threw me off and I
think it may throw others off who are first using the software. I welcome
any suggestions or opinions.
Thanks again!
Toni

Glad if my inputs did sort this out in some way.
I haven't referred to this topic in the guide.
Yes! few aspects are actually confusing for the end user to understand,
even I have been changing it to be even more user friendly.

Have a nice day!

Kind regards
Shravani

Four comments...

1/
To my mind there's a missing piece of information: the definition of (or how to determine) the default font.

Is it the Font used by the Default paragraph style (and if so, is it the Family, the Asian Text Font, or the CTL Font)?

Or is it something else, like the Default character style (and if so, is it the Family, the Asian Text Font, or the CTL Font)?

Or something else?

2/
The information callout says:
"If you want to find text with any font by name, click the Format button in the Find & Replace dialog of LibreOffice Writer."

Since people may read just the callout, should it perhaps instead say:
"If you want to find text with any font by name (that is not the default font), click the Format button in the Find & Replace dialog of LibreOffice Writer."

3/
Also, reading the text reminds me of why I originally joined the team - to try to write up what I've been learning about what is meant by direct formatting.

I've had so little spare time I still haven't made any contribution in that area. So I wonder if, in the opening paragraph that opens by saying:
"You can search for text with attributes that are applied either by direct formatting or by styles."
- whether the mention of "direct formatting" could be hyperlinked to any documentation that explains what's meant by that. Or is that an area where I could still perhaps make a contribution?

4/
One final small suggestion: in the "To search for all font changes" section, might it be a good idea to add a sentence like:
"To search for a specific font (e.g. Times Roman), or a particular font style (e.g. Italic), select "Format..." instead of "Attributes..." in the Find & Replace panel", followed by the "Font" tab in the provided "Search for formatting" panel.

luke

Thank you for the helpful comments Luke. I will plan to put your
suggestion 4 in the documentation.
Can anyone explain the difference between an attribute and a format in
"beginner" or "layperson" language? I don't think I have a good
understanding. I couldn't find it in the documentation, but perhaps I
overlooked it.
Have an awesome day!
Toni

Toni,

Based on my current understanding, the current names of those buttons don't
really make any sense. Note how the "No Format" button clears both. I don't
think the current help text is any good either.

I would describe the "formats" you can search for as specific instances or
valuations of the "attributes".
attribute -> format a/b/c
color -> auto, red, blue, ...
font -> Liberation Sans, Liberation Serif...
etc.

But this has nothing to do with any normal meaning of the words "format" or
"attribute". So I wouldn't worry too much about the words themselves, and
just describe what the features do. Examples:
- If you want to search for *any* manually applied font, click the
"Attributes" button and check the box next to "Font", then click "OK".
- If you want to search for *a particular* manually applied font, such as
"Liberation Serif", click the "Format" button, then...

--Kenneth

Format is presentation markup.
Attribute is the specific quality associated with the presentation markup.

Presentation markup is the stuff to use to make your document look good,
bad, ugly, etc.

Setting _Comic Sans_ as the font, is setting an attribute (the font) for
the presentation markup.

Setting _Libre Office Green 0_as the foreground colour, is setting an
attribute (ink colour) of the presentation markup.

Note: Attribute can also refer to syntactical markup. However, that
would be beyond the scope of the documentation you are working on.

jonathon

That is the normal and expected behaviour.
No format should leave the text with the default font, size, and colour.

jonathon

Find and Replace is ancient programming and should be working at this
stage. It might be something else that is making this an issue. C/C++
ancient programming code for Find and Replace. It looks like it might be
something with the button or the drop down menu/type ahead field and not
the basic Find and Replace.

example: drop down menu or type ahead field is missing the font selection

1.404.584.8180 office
www.linkedin.com/in/vandyjuggler