Section Breaks, frustration and general madness

Question

Level 1

17 points

Section Breaks, frustration and general madness

Hi, this has been killing me for hours.

I have a 12 page document, I want to move page 6 to the end, but if I select it, all pages from 6-12 are grouped and moved as 1. This is not what I want.

I've done some research and it seems that my lack of section breaks is to blame (not something I've ever had to deal with in dare I say it, MS Word).

So, now ive gone through my document and dutifully added section breaks in appropriate places BUT now I have 1 extra blank page after every section THAT I CANT DELETE.

Now i'm fairly certain this is user error, but its a user error that Word didnt make me encounter. can someone please tell me how to reorder my pages or sort out remove randomly added blank pages after each section break!

many many many thanks!

MBP, Mac OS X (10.5.7)

Posted on Jun 24, 2009 4:10 PM

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Answer 1

Jun 24, 2009 6:36 PM in response to The_Drew

You simply have something like a paragraph or page break that is spilling over.

To see these:

+Menu > View > Show Layout+

Insert your cursor before the offending break, but after the section break and delete forward to eliminate them.

Peter

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Answer 2

Drifder

Level 1

5 points

Jun 24, 2009 6:51 PM in response to The_Drew

Hi Drew,

I just recently went through the same frustrations as yourself, but luckily I was able to overcome the problem and I hope I can help. First off, you don't have to insert blank pages or text pages for your section breaks. I'm not sure if you were using the sections button in the toolbar of Pages, but if so then you would get a new section and a blank page or text page. Instead, place your cursor at the very beginning of the pages normal typing area. Make sure your cursor is not in a text box or in your header box. You then want to select Insert then Section Break at the very top of your screen. This should place a section break before the page you selected. Then do the opposite to make a break at the end of the page, making sure the cursor is not in the footer box or some other text box you may have inserted. If you try to go to Insert and then Section Break and is not selectable, then most likely your cursor is not in the right location. I recommend trying a fresh blank document and practicing this to see how it works. Once you have your section breaks you should be able to move the sections wherever you please using View> Page Thumbnails, which should bring up your sections. As far as deleting the blank pages, you should be able to right click and delete them from the Thumbnails view as well. If not most likely, as the previous poster implied, you have sections overlapping on the offending pages.

Hope that helps!

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Answer 3

Jun 24, 2009 8:18 PM in response to Drifder

Now Drifder,

Would you like some tips on adding breaks in your posts to make them readable? 🙂

Peter

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Answer 4

The_Drew Author

Level 1

17 points

Jun 25, 2009 2:08 AM in response to Drifder

Hi Drifder

Thank you so much for your help: Problem now sorted!

I have to say, that I am disappointed in the way Pages manages sections, I guess its for a good reason and to prevent you getting your text out of sync, but it should communicate that to you I feel. Its taken me over 12 hours to fix this problem, which is time spent NOT working on the content of the document.

Clearly, its a bit frustrating.

Thanks all for your help.

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Answer 5

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

Jun 25, 2009 2:19 AM in response to The_Drew

The_Drew wrote:

Its taken me over 12 hours to fix this problem, which is time spent NOT working on the content of the document.

Reading the Pages User Guide requires less than 12 hours and you would have get the response … and learn a lot of useful things 😉

Yvan KOENIG (from FRANCE jeudi 25 juin 2009 11:19:04)

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Answer 6

The_Drew Author

Level 1

17 points

Jun 25, 2009 2:48 AM in response to KOENIG Yvan

I've noticed you're a big fan of having people read the manual, that being your advice in a lot of your posts.

Its sage advice indeed, but reading the manual is fine when you know what the problem is and you can therefore search for it, but how would one know that "sections" (or a lack thereof) were what was causing the problem?

Much better IMO to ask for advice in a forum of people who would likely have solved this problem before....

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Answer 7

The_Drew Author

Level 1

17 points

Jun 25, 2009 3:12 AM in response to The_Drew

The problem was caused by me not having broken my document into relative sections. Pages therefore thought that all 12 pages were 1 section and it won't let you reorder "pages" within "sections".

I solved this by inserting section breaks at appropriate points (at the end of a relevant paragraph for example), this allowed me to move my "sections" around in the thumbnail view as I needed.

The errant blank pages were caused by having "breaks" inserted incorrectly, I solved this by turning on "invisibles" under the "view" menu and simply deleting those (paragraph breaks, page breaks etc) that were in the wrong place.

In conclusion, you need to stop thinking of your documents as "pages" and start thinking of them as a collection of "sections", once you've told the program which bits of text constitute a coherent section (by using section breaks) then you can move them around freely.

It took a while to get used to, particularly as Word doesn't care about your text and just surrenders itself to the (incorrect) whims of the user, but now that penny has dropped, its made me have a new found respect for Pages.

It helped me to stop thinking of my document in terms of pages and start thinking of it as a series of sections: OK, so, you have a master "document" that you're writing in Pages (the application).

Your "document" is a series of text, pictures and data that are actually (as far as Pages is concerned) a collection of "sections". Your "sections" appear within the "document" on physical "pages" i.e. the pieces of paper that your document will be printed on.

When you're trying to reorder "pages", Pages (the application) tries to prevent your document from going all hong kong phooey by only allowing you to reorder "sections" instead. If 1 section ends on page 12 and another section starts immediately on the same page, Pages (the application) will assume they are actually separate paragraphs of the same section and won't let you move them independently.

You fix this by inserting section breaks at the end of each section, Pages (the application) will then start your new section on a new page and your Table of Contents will be updated accordingly.

Its remarkably simple, you just have a little pain barrier to go through where you scream and shout at your mac and say things like "**** you Apple, you're meant to be the interface experts" and then you discover through the helpful people on this forum that you were doing it wrong and the application was trying to preserve your documents integrity.

If you're still reading, I'm shocked, but goodnight, thank you and may your god go with you.

x

P.S. I'm not religious btw....

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Answer 8

Jun 25, 2009 4:31 PM in response to The_Drew

The_Drew wrote:
I've noticed you're a big fan of having people read the manual, that being your advice in a lot of your posts.

Its sage advice indeed, but reading the manual is fine when you know what the problem is and you can therefore search for it, but how would one know that "sections" (or a lack thereof) were what was causing the problem?

Much better IMO to ask for advice in a forum of people who would likely have solved this problem before....

It is fair to point people to reading the Pages09_UserGuide.pdf because many posters here haven't bothered or simply don't know where to get it. Why it isn't just installed with Pages and opens from the Help menu is just another of those excellent design decisions which the Pages programmers have made based on +80% of users demanding it!+ (dripping sarcasm here).

Speaking as someone who has delved into it extensively, yes it does leave a lot to be desired and the search function is both obscure and inaccurate. Also there is a LOT that doesn't get mentioned including whole sections of Pages. Layout mode is nearly ignored for example. Probably for good reason IMHO.

But it is one of the few resources to getting answers and a start on finding alternate methods if they are not detailed there. If nothing else it puts us all on the same Page (pun intended) when we discuss things here. If nothing we are calling things by the same names.

Peter

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Answer 9

The_Drew Author

Level 1

17 points

Jun 26, 2009 7:11 AM in response to PeterBreis0807

I'm not saying its not, but a lot of people work to a tight deadline and "read the manual" just doesn't cut it.

I don't think its unfair to assume people posting questions need quick answers, yes the manual will ultimately give you the answer AND more information to boot, but I need an answer quickly, hence why I supplicate myself to the great Macintosh community.

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Answer 10

Jun 26, 2009 2:14 PM in response to The_Drew

We are unusually fast with responses here, but a quick trip to the manual is not out of the question and sometimes eliminates even the delays you get here.

You may even be able to tell us something new!

Peter

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Answer 11

Jun 26, 2009 4:07 PM in response to The_Drew

While we're at it - it appears that a section break starts a new page -URRG!
I want to insert a section break but I want it continuous - on the same page as the last section. I've looked at the manual! There's nothing there about continuous sections (as they're called in Word) - it appears that all you can get are section breaks that force the next section onto a new page.
If I'm wrong about that, can someone tell me how to insert a continuous section break?
Thanks

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Answer 12

The_Drew Author

Level 1

17 points

Jun 26, 2009 4:17 PM in response to judithnewman

I'm no expert (clearly), but I think Pages would want you to use a layout break for that.

It will allow you to start your next paragraph on the same page, but I dont think it will allow you to reorder those pages unless you started your new section on a new page.

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Answer 13

Peggy

Level 8

41,847 points

Jun 26, 2009 5:32 PM in response to judithnewman

As The_Drew said, I believe you want a layout break. Different programmers often give certain functions different names than other programmers do, even within the same company. It can be very confusing trying to figure out what you need & what it might be called.

I used several as well as floating text boxes in this newsletter done in Pages 1/iWork '05.

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Answer 14

Jun 26, 2009 11:08 PM in response to judithnewman

Judith,

Now you know what to look for, you can go back to the manual and see how to do Layout breaks in detail, although it is fairly straightforward. I think Layout breaks is a better term than continuous sections! 🙂

You might also go through the excellent video tutorials available under the Help menu.

Peter

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Answer 15

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

Jun 27, 2009 2:22 AM in response to The_Drew

You wrote that you lost 12 hours.
These 12 hours would be sufficient to read the User Guide.
Reading it, you would have encounter the page describing the behaviour of sections without searching this specific item.

It's the huge difference between a "reading process" and a "searching one".

When I get a new program, I always read the user guide. Of course I don't remember everything but at least I remember the spelling used for items used in the beast.
So, when I encounter a problem, I know what to search in the resources.

Maybe it's because I worked during 30 years with proprietary techniques which I was the only one aware that I am acustomed to rely on my own ability to search infos in available resources.
I have difficulties to be confident in infos which I didn't got by myself. And practice prove that most often, when I was confident, it was a bad idea.

Urging users to look in the available resources is not my own advice.
It's written in the forum's "Help and Terms of Use" document:

+_If you have a technical question about an Apple product, be sure to check out Apple's support resources first by consulting the application Help menu on your computer and visiting our Support site to view articles and more on our product support pages._+

Yvan KOENIG (from FRANCE samedi 27 juin 2009 11:18:59)

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