Layout Issues

redinhawaii

I have a couple of frustrations within LayOut.
I have made a template in LayOut, and want it to be constant. I have some precisely located section cut lines. When I save the template, and then import a new plan file, these section cut lines need to remain in a constant location. But they do not currtsently. Do I need to "lock' them? So in order to save the template as locked it seems to need a minimum of 2 layers, as one cannot be locked. Is this how one would go about doing this?
How do I modify the "default settings" so that my fonts and styles I set up can be as I want them when I open up into LO?
Tables and Lists,
I find no references on how to effectively use these features.
thanks,
aloha
red

Gaieus

Hi Red,

I'm not sure I can follow you. What section cut lines are you using in your LO template?

As for locked layers; it would seem to be logical for me to keep at least one unlocked layer since that's where you can insert content.

Dave R

Red,

I'm also not quite following you on the section cuts in LO.

As far as tables and lists go, I generally format them in a word processor such as MSWord. Then I cioopy and paste the test into a text box in LO. The tables I use are initially created as CSV files and need some manipulating and massaging before they are useful to me so I open those tables in Excel first.

bjanzen

Could you clarify the section cuts point? I'm not seeing it, either.
The "default settings" are picked up from your template, so if you create a template with Helvetica, you should get Helvetica the first time you select a text box. Likewise Shape Style inspector should pick up it's information from the template. I don't recall off the top of my head if it's the first font and shape style you use to create the template or the last one. I'll check.
Tables and Lists are built into the text system on Mac. On PC, you need to do as Dave said and create them in another program and save as RTF, then insert. On Mac, the List and Table menu items are under the Text menu.

b

bjanzen

Oops - I tried posting and I think my session expired.

I was close. It COULD be the last shape style or text style that you used before saving your template. It's really the last shape style or text style you chose before choosing the tool (a shape, or the text tool). Here's some examples I tried.

Open a blank document. Change line color to red, no fill, then select the rectangle tool. Draw a red rectangle. Select the circle tool. Draw a red circle. Use the select tool and change the circle to blue. Save as Template. Open new from template and the default line color is.... (red / blue). A - Red.
Open a blank document. Change line color to red, no fill, then select the rectangle tool. Draw a red rectangle. Change the line color to blue. Select the circle tool. Draw a blue circle. Save as Template. Open new from template and the default line color is.... (red / blue). A - Blue.

Same thing goes for fonts. It's not necessarily the last one used, it's the last one selected before selecting the text tool.

Hope that helps.

b

redinhawaii

great help, I would never have figured that out.
thanks again