Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 19550
Font Selection List Disabled When Specifying Special Characters in AutoCorrect
Last modified: 2013-08-07 14:38:26 UTC
Go to Tools > AutoCorrect/AutoFormat > Replace tab. Right click on the "With" selection box to insert a Special Character. The Font list to select a different font for the replacement is disabled. Further, the font that is available is the first one on my font list, which, while it is a symbol font, is not the one I want to use. This behavior is also present in Calc. This makes it quite cumbersome to work on documents that require frequent insertion of symbols and other glyphs. Instead of being able to type a "shorthand" version and have it automatically replaced, each symbol has to be manually inserted via Insert > Special Characters, or much copying and pasting. A work around that was suggested in the users mailing list was to copy and paste the symbol into the "With" box. However, the symbol is not maintained -- the alphabetical keystroke for the document default font is inserted instead.
I agree. This has been quite a problem for me. I should have filed an Enhancement issue for this a long time ago, but I just went with the clumsier workaround.
i will reassign this to bh and change the issue type to enhancement. @Tamblyne: can you please change the status to UNCONFIRMED if you post a issue? because of your status as Observer all your issues are set as new by default. if this is intended by you, set at least a target to OOo later. :) thank you
Thank you, JW -- I thought I had done all of that, but do remember having some problems getting this to post. I appreciate the "heads up" to double - double check this stuff. Tam
tamblyne, where exactly is the disabled font list you mention: == quote == Go to Tools > AutoCorrect/AutoFormat > Replace tab. Right click on the "With" selection box to insert a Special Character. The Font list to select a different font for the replacement is disabled. == /quote == In OOo 1.1.0 on my Win98, in the Replace tab dialog I only find "New" and "Delete" as buttons. No font list.
Hi, Guido! When I pulled this up to take a look at it again, I was confused also and wondered what I was talking about -- took me a minute to figure it out! lol When you go to Tools > AutoCorrect/AutoFormat > Replace tab, if you then right click in the INPUT boxes, i.e., under "Replace" or "With", you'll get a menu that includes "Paste", "Select All", or "Special Character". Select "Special Character". The "Special Characters" dialog opens up, but the "Font" selection list at the top of that box is greyed out -- so you can't choose a new font. For example, if I want to use some astrological symbols (which are a PITA to select individually) and want to just type "ari*" and have that automatically replaced with the appropriate symbol from the astrological font, it isn't possible to set this up via AutoCorrect. Hope this makes it more clear. Thanks for the heads up. :) Tam
copy and paste or selecting the text and then launching the window should work. Make sure that you don't check "[ ] text only" and don't be mislead by the display. There's another bug (issue 7555)that OOo doesn't display the right character in the dialog, but the actual replacement should work nevertheless. If this still doesn't work, please file a seperate issue regarding that problem. Thank you.
Hi, Cloph -- No, it doesn't work. Not only is the symbol not maintained in the dialog box, but the auto replacement doesn't work, either. The default font for the document is still used, no matter what method I attempt to use to signify the proper replacement character. This is with OOo 1.1.1b.
@tamblyne Please file another issue (remember: one issue per problem) and please give a detailed explanation on how you tried to enter the replacement (copy & paste, selection, ...) - make sure you don't check "text only", please attach a screenshot of the dialog right before adding the replacement. Thank you.
Hi -- Thanks for the comments, but I won't be filing an additional issue. I mentioned the workaround -- which isn't working -- only as additional information. My goal is to have the issue I filed fixed. : ) Tam
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This is a problem still for me, using OO 1.1.3 on Windows. I agree with tamblyne's comments: the issue is perfectly well described here, so why create another issue? IMO, this is a BUG, not a feature request. The combo box in the Special Characters dialog should not be greyed out. I discovered this bug when I found that the sequence '-->' was not converted to a right-arrow, as in Word. Word's default auto-correct replaces this sequence with the Wingdings character 224. I respectfully submit that this bug should be fixed ASAP.
This behavior also exists in Writer - Insert - Note. R-click edit field, "Special character" - font selection is disabled.
To grep the issues easier via "requirements" I put the issues currently lying on my owner to the owner "requirements".