Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 23997
Footnotes cause page breaks and page or column layout to be destroyed
Last modified: 2013-02-07 22:38:43 UTC
Consider a two column or one column page which has footnotes. The page is already layouted so that it's layout items (text/objects) fill up most of the space the page provides. Now, add a footnote and start editing it. The footnote will now expand it's height according to the text being entered. It will expand until it causes the page break or re-layouting of the elements on the page, then it will itself break up and consume space on either the next page or next column. This causes the original layout to be destroyed and, eventually causes at least one page break. I don't necessarily think that this is intentional ;-) Proposal: Before breaking the layout, the footnote should only be allowed to expand in space (in height) to what is available on the current page, then it should itself resolve to a more pro-active behaviour in that it should break up and continue either on the next page or column instead of breaking the layout.
The behavior you mention as a problem is common to most word processors. I have had some problems with MS Word moving entire footnotes two or three pages away when they got too big. With OOo, I don't have that problem,but I do have to consider the effects of an excessively long footnote. The problem you mention suggests a solution, and that would be to permit split footnotes at the user's option. Once the footnote messed up the layout, I would like to have the option to remove a line of text to get my layout back and be able to right-click and have the option to continue the footnote on the next page rather than mess up my layout. Alternatively, as you suggest, the layout would be considered sacrosanct by the footnote frame so it would automatically become a continuing footnote. The problem with that is seen in the situation where the footnote is the last page of a section and now the continuation is on the first page of the next section -- something likely NOT wanted. What I have seen in some works is a blank page with the footnote continued on the blank page for the last situation. As I look over the options, I prefer the one where footnotes cannot change a basic layout but automatically extend to continuing footnotes on a blank page or column if a new section immediately follows the column or page that contains the footnote. For publishers, this option competes with the one where the footnote is on one page and the text continues on an additional column or page.
Reassigned to BH
I have a problem with OOo writer moving entire footnotes to the page after the footnote rather than the page on which the footnote anchor appears. Yes, I have also had this problem with MS word. I have tried everything I can think of in the "text flow" style section. I would do anything to have ALL of ALL the footnotes on the same page as their anchors. Is this not possible? If not, does anyone know when this issue might be fixed? thanks, Matt for reference, this issue may be related also to issue 29680 (May 2004)
To grep the issues easier via "requirements" I put the issues currently lying on my owner to the owner "requirements".
*** Issue 114169 has been marked as a duplicate of this issue. ***