Level 1

32 points

how to set indentations

Pages is driving me nuts. The menu system is obtuse with many common functions having unrecognizable names and buried deep in multiple menus.

Here is my problem. I am writing an engineering specification document. I have headers with 1.0, 2.0.... and subheadings with 1.1, 1.2.... I am not using the automatic heading system (lists), but typing the indents and numbers myself.

The problem is, I see no way to control the indentation of the lines after the first line. I want the following lines indented beyond the number in the first line. Somehow I have several sections with the indents correctly done. I don't know how. Other sections have the following lines to the left of the first line.

I have tried everything I can think of and looked through all the menus and Help and find nothing that describes how to set indentations. The margin and tab icons at the top are no help.

I would appreciate any help.

Posted on May 19, 2011 6:59 AM

47 replies

fruhulda

Level 6

15,167 points

May 19, 2011 10:30 AM in response to Cosman

Create a Paragraph style with your tab settings => tab style

You have to look in the Inspector palette for the differences. Remember the palette show the measures etc. for the part where the insertion point is. You have to compare paragraph for paragraph and look in the palette, mainly in the T tab.

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 10:34 AM in response to Cosman

OK, so I opened the Paragraph Styles window and clicked in the 2.5 line. Styles window says "Normal". Then I clicked in the 3.1 line. Styles window says "Normal".

Then I highlighted from 2.1 down to 3.3 and doubled clicked Normal. All the highlighted lines jumped to a new position, all aligned with each other.

1) why did they both read Normal, when they weren't the same

2) why did they jump to new positions when I clicked Normal again

3) why are the new Normal positions different from the old normal positions? See 3.4, 3.5, which are "Normal".

I don't use styles, I always use the default value and use bold and italics in the font menu to show differences in text. So far, I have wasted about 5 hours fighting with this mess on one document that was due yesterday.

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 10:41 AM in response to fruhulda

Sorry, I am looking at the Tab settings of the Text window of the Inspector and I don't see anything that says Tab Styles.

In the Styles Drawer I don't see anything that says Tab Styles.

fruhulda

Level 6

15,167 points

May 19, 2011 10:45 AM in response to Cosman

Pages relies a lot on styles. When you compared the paragraph and both showed Normal style. That must be an added style. Did it have a red triangle? That means the paragraph is connected to normal but there are also some changes. The next paragraph was different. When you selected both paragraphs and clicked again you changed the paragraph to the set Normal style.

I think you should give yourself sometime and learn about using styles. How to redefine styles and so forth. Download the Pages User Guide from the Help menu in your Pages. Get a book like The missing Manual on iWork. See videos here http://www.apple.com/support/pages/

Pages is not as intuitive as some wold like, especially not if you have learnt how other word processing apps work. It took me a while to go from AppleWorks to Pages.

fruhulda

Level 6

15,167 points

May 19, 2011 10:48 AM in response to Cosman

I did write that you have to create a style that has the settings for your tabs and you can call it tab style.

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 10:56 AM in response to fruhulda

Since I always use the default settings I don't see how this is the source of any problems, especially when all the windows I can see say exactly the same thing for each of the different parameters.

Perhaps the default settings don't properly set up in a new document unless you specifially click a style. It looks like I have different styles throughout the document even thought I didn't set any, and everywhere I click it says "Normal". Not good behavior in a piece of software.

If I had visibility of what was going on, I could have fixed it long ago. I hate Word, but it shows everything that is going on. I feel blind using Pages.

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 11:11 AM in response to fruhulda

fruhulda,

Thanks for all your help. There are red buttons beside Normal, None, and None for anywhere I click in the document.

It would have been very easy for the programmers to show special styles as submenus in the list. That would make everything visible. Nothing in the Pages Help indicated anything like what I have gone through, which is troubleshooting, not normal setup.

Without visibility you cannot troubleshoot. Right now I don't have the time to spend pouring through the Users Guide or Books to try to do simple things. I will have to take it on the fly.

I think I can handle it from here. Thanks again.

This experience confirms that Apple has done a very poor job programming this application.

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

May 19, 2011 11:31 AM in response to Cosman

I don't understand your problem.

When the cursor is in a given paragraph, the ruler applying to this one is displayed at the top of the page (at least if you asked the app to display the rulers).

Numerical infos are available in the Inspector of Text.

But I repeat, the displayed info are those linked to the paragraph in which the cursor is located.

If you don't want to use "named styles", use at least the feature allowing us to copy on the fly a paragraph style to apply it to an other paragraph. It's faster than resetting the tabs by hand and it's safer.

I rebuilt the rulers applying to your different screenshots and they were different for the paragraphs about which you were asking why they behave differently. Different ruler settings give different behavior. Nothing obscure, nothing wrong with that.

Just, one more time, a bug somewhere between the keyboard and the chair.

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) jeudi 19 mai 2011 20:31:46

Please :

Search for questions similar to your own before submitting them to the community

To be the AW6 successor, iWork MUST integrate a TRUE DB, not a list organizer !

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 11:54 AM in response to KOENIG Yvan

Koenig,

The first thing I looked at when all these problems arose was the ruler the Text menus, and the Styles drawer. I could see no difference between them. I sent screen shots of the rulers and Inspector when different paragraphs were selected. I also looked at every window that had anything to do with tabs, or indentations. I could see no difference. The problem was invisible.

It appears that all the problems were from different styles being active, but since I only use the default styles, I had no clue that there were any differences. When fruhulda directed me to the Styles pull out drawer, I could see no differences in and style settings when I clicked in the different paragraphs. So, I don't know how styles got modified, since I don't use them.

fruhulda did point the way to the solution, which you are alluding too also. I made up three custom styles for the headers, indent #1 and indent #2. I also assigned hot keys to each of them.

I then went through the whole document and set every paragraph using the styles created above.

This has straightened out the document. It does not change my opinion of the poor user interface in Pages that allow me to have this much trouble. As I have said before, I hate Word, but I can see everything that is going on and fix it (if it's fixable). Pages is convoluted and tedious to find the elements. It doesn't have good visibility when trying to trouble shoot problems. Pages Help was useless for troubleshooting, simply because the visibility isn't there to see whate the problem is.

I can spend a week reading books and User's guides, and maybe I should, but this is not the Apple professional level software it should be.

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

May 19, 2011 12:18 PM in response to Cosman

I apologize but you didn't read carefully !

I didn't urged you to apply named styles as Fruhulda did.

I asked you to define the settings for a paragraph.

Then each time you want to get the same layout,

click in the already formatted paragraph,

click the button [Copier le style] (I used deliberately its French title to allow you to see it on the screenshot which I posted)

Click in the paragraph which must be formatted

click in the button [Coller le style].

If you didn't install these buttons in the Tools palette, I can't do that for you but you may use the menu items :

I didn't searched in the User Guide to learn what I described.

I looked in it to check the English wording because I'm not sure of my English.

Personal advices are really different.

When my grand son ask me for help on the PC which he use with the apps delivered by its school, I feel that Office has no visibility, that everything is obscure, convoluted and tedious. With Pages, I find the wanted features quite easily.

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) jeudi 19 mai 2011 21:13:33

Please :

Search for questions similar to your own before submitting them to the community

To be the AW6 successor, iWork MUST integrate a TRUE DB, not a list organizer !

May 19, 2011 12:22 PM in response to Cosman

Cosman wrote:

Where would I see the difference displayed. What menu/window?

On the Ruler.

Jerry

Cosman Author

Level 1

32 points

May 19, 2011 12:32 PM in response to Jerrold Green1

See my previous posts. I sent two pictures of the rulers and other windows. I could see no differences. That is what triggered my posts here. I couldn't see any indication of what was wrong.

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

May 19, 2011 12:42 PM in response to Cosman

There is something weird with the forum.

I posted twice a message with three screenshots and it didn't appear.

I make an other attempt using 3 messages this time.

The cursor is in the highlighted paragraph.

The tab stops defining its behavior are perfectly visible.

When the cursor is in this paragraph, click the button [Copier le style] or trigger the menu item

Copier le style de paragraphe

to_continue…

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) jeudi 19 mai 2011 21:42:04

Please :

Search for questions similar to your own before submitting them to the community

To be the AW6 successor, iWork MUST integrate a TRUE DB, not a list organizer !

KOENIG Yvan

Level 8

41,819 points

May 19, 2011 12:47 PM in response to KOENIG Yvan

I clicked in the paragraph starting with 1) then clicked the button [Coller le style]

Triggering the menu item Coller le style de paragraphe was able to achieve the same task :

the paragraph receive the attributes of the one which was highlighted.

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) jeudi 19 mai 2011 21:47:05

Please :

Search for questions similar to your own before submitting them to the community

To be the AW6 successor, iWork MUST integrate a TRUE DB, not a list organizer !

May 19, 2011 12:53 PM in response to Cosman

Cosman wrote:

See my previous posts. I sent two pictures of the rulers and other windows. I could see no differences. That is what triggered my posts here. I couldn't see any indication of what was wrong.

I did read your previous posts. Try to understand what we have to go on from your posts. In one screen shot, we can see a cursor and the text where the cursor is displayed matches the ruler exactly. In the other shot there is no cursor displayed, and no text selected, so we have no idea if where the cursor is supposed to be matches the ruler or not.

Everything that is displayed on the Ruler is also shown in the Text Tabs Inspector. The Indent is shown at the top and the tab stops are listed at the bottom.

Jerry

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how to set indentations