Tricks for working with fields

OpenOffice.org 2.x Writer Guide

Chapter 14: Working with Fields

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• Quick and easy field entry
• Using document properties to hold information that changes
• Using other fields to hold information that changes
• Using AutoText to insert often-used fields
• Defining your own numbering sequences
• Using automatic cross-references
• Using fields in headers and footers
• Using fields instead of outline numbering for chapter numbers
• Tricks for working with fields
• Developing conditional content
• Using placeholder fields

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Keyboard shortcuts for fields

Here are some handy keyboard shortcuts to use when working with fields:

Ctrl+F2   Open the Fields dialog box.

Ctrl+F8   Field shadings on/off.

Ctrl+F9   Show/hide field names.

F9   Update fields.

Fixing the contents of fields

You can specify Fixed content for many items on the Document and DocInformation tabs so the field contents do not update. For example, you might use a field to insert the creation date of a document, and you would not want that date to change. In another place you might use a date field to show the current date, which you do want to change; in that case, deselect Fixed content when you insert the field.

Converting fields into text

Writer does not provide any easy way to convert field contents into text. To do this, you need to copy the field contents and paste them back as unformatted text. This is not a very good solution if you have hundreds of fields that you want to change, but you could use a macro to automate the process.