[Libreoffice-bugs] [Bug 135871] Highlighting no fill is not the same as no fill; there is still direct formatting present according to paragraph style

Tue Sep 1 20:18:00 UTC 2020

https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=135871

--- Comment #8 from Telesto <telesto at surfxs.nl> ---
Created attachment 164990
  --> https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/attachment.cgi?id=164990&action=edit
Example 2 (bold)

(In reply to Mike Kaganski from comment #7)
> (In reply to Telesto from comment #5)
> 
> No. Ctrl+M is *not* a last resort. There are hundreds of possible pieces of
> manual formatting. They interact in different ways to result in what you
> see, with no easy way to know which specific manual setting produced this
> effect. If you took time to learn e.g. rationale for styles inspector, you
> would know that. Introducing those hundreds of tools for a task that is not
> going to be used is just useless.
> 
> WF imo.

I'm not asking for hundreds (or thousands of tools). I'm only taking about the
formatting toolbar. My major problem is that if you started using direct
formatting, there is no to they untouched state for a specific direct
formatting. They direct formatting will keep interfering with styles.

Another example
1. Open the attached file
2. Select World
3. CTRL+B
4. CTRL+B
5. Change paragraph style to Default paragraph style

-> In this case BOLD is DF.

This makes the usage of styles quickly hard and confusing. The opposite of
what's intended. And doesn't result in the quick and easy layout changes as
advertised. You need to be very very disciplined not to use DF somewhere, at
some point.
And the whole idea of quickly changes a style becomes quite a check, double
check, triple check the document again (as there might be DF at at a place it
should be)

And LibreOffice is surely not design to prevent or easily correct such a
mistake without CTRL+M (throwing all formatting - even the intended stuff -
away). 
No someone starts with .. you should have used Character Styles.. but applying
those is cumbersome. CTRL+B is faster.. or for the ones who love markdown
*bold* (still DF). And no, you might not interested in changing the look of the
DF text, again. So usage of those styles rather pointless (a contrary to the
Paragraph styles)

A similar problem arises with 'no-fill'. If you highlight some (direct
formatted text, font type bold etc) text with yellow, and want to remove it,
you use no-fill. Which works with the DF paradigm. However "no fill" is
literally no fill in the page style paradigm. So if highlighting being able in
a style, no fill overrides the style if it has highlighting in it

Something similar with font color automatic. I assumed, back to 'style
inheritance', but this is not the case.

They Style Inspector reliefs some of black box effect. But feels more after the
fact tool, instead of mitigating the cause (pre-emptive). If you make a mistake
with DF, it will hunt you.. there is no leniency

And I personally tend to Write first an care about the layout in a later
stadium. So surely use some DF in the process. Maybe even undo afterwards
(disabled bold), but still lingering in the background.

CTRL+M removes all direct formatting (except as it seems the language
setting?); which is rather excessive number of cases. If you 'want to remove
the bold' DF, but keep the Italic. 
If I used different fonts in some sentences with and also applied a font color
(which being reverted to automatic), it can't be managed by styles anymore. 

And it's already hard to see bold highlight up in the DF formatting toolbar
with if this actually being caused by a paragraph/character style. And if you
unbold/bold again, you applied DF.

This this makes styles rather fuzz to use. Confusing, tiresome to manage/ and
keep track off. You simple drop the styles, as and do it the old an dirty DF
way. Except for areas like Headings. Because the style causing way to much
strain to be used in the whole document. Only to hardcore users remain; instead
of being useful in general.

For the Italic/Bold/Underline area you use one button to things. As DF toggle
button. And as button to show the current active style formatting. In exact the
same way... with the same button (which is a mistake)

In extension of that, if you have default paragraph style and press bold
button, the non-bold becomes bold. Press Bold button again it it's unbolded.
But not back to paragraph style, now it's unbold as DF. 
Visa versa. If paragraph style is a bold, the BOLD button in the toolbar will
be highlighted. And you press unbold, a DF unbold is applied. And the button
becomes de-activated. Press BOLD again, button become active (as at the start)
and text will be bold, but this is DF bold, not style bold. (So GUI is not
informative at all). And secondly there is no way to get rid of the direct
formatting again.. (problem two)

There is CTRL+M; however actually removes all formatting. In theory a 'special
remove formatting' dialog could be created, where could be selected which DF
should be removed. In some sense as the Special Paste dialog in Calc. This
would make it possible to pick the stuff you want to remove, instead of all or
nothing. However still patch on a wound.

Next to it you have the 'no-fill' and 'automatic' terminology. No fill effect
means something different in they DF world compared to they PS world. And there
is even no alternative offered, next to no fill. Automatic has for me the
'default/PS meaning' but that's true either. And also here no alternative.

A solution would that bold;italic/underline and such shouldn't be binary toggle
on/off but have tripple state. Bold/unbold/off (style based). While Style Based
Bold button have different look different, compared to DF Bold. Border around
the button or whatever to make it distinct..

If the objection should be people get confused by tripple states or whatever;
start with additional toolbar offering this. And propagate that one to be used
when using styles [and can be added to the initial configuration 'wizard' the
customize LibreOffice first launch/or being accessed later on. There quite a
number 'disputable' defaults. From tabbed dialog to markdown or spell checker
ignoring numbers in words as wrong spelled.]. Most of those setting are now at
forced on say 50% of the user base. Causing questions & frustration. And no, I
don't automatically setting, and if so, I don't know how it's called nor where
to look]    

Related to highlighting and font color an additional 'off' button should be
offered. 

FWIW, I'm not intending to 'solve' all the DF issues. And CTRL+M might be still
useful, but it currently needs to be used far to often. This simply should be
needed for the most applied formatting options (as shown in the formatting
toolbar). This simply a UX/design flaw. That users don't grasp the styles
concept or having trouble with it, is caused/aggravated by how it's implemented
in LibreOffice.

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