Numbered list indent - how to adjust?

[Kino]

You cannot get rid of the indent but you can shorten it by setting a tab stop.

figure1.png (12.89 KiB) Viewed 3818 times

You have to set a different tab stop for number 10 and higher, that you may find tedious.

figure2.png (16.71 KiB) Viewed 3818 times

But if I were you, I would not use a list style for such a purpose. I would use a normal text for "Figure 1.", "Figure 2.", etc. and would update them by a macro like this.
http://nisus.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=16827#p16827

[martin]

All I really want is to get rid of that indent.

As Kino says, there's no way to completely remove the indent between the list item and the paragraph's main text. Is that what you're after?

I'm going to attach a demonstration document that hopefully makes the behavior of our list style indents more clear:

list indent demonstration.zrtf

(5.88 KiB) Downloaded 388 times

Let me know if you have any questions.

If you do want some indent and you feel NWP is misbehaving in some way, can you please send me your document to have a look? Thanks.

[greenmorpher]

Dan sez:

All I really want is to get rid of that indent.

Oh good grief, at last I understand what you actually want the result to be, Dan. You’re not asking a question about gum drops. Seems we have suffered a miscommunication here. I got fixated on the gumdrops; maybe it’s the heat here in Melbourne. Sorry.

Proper tone restored (although it's 32 C in my office already at 10 am and going higher):

You can achieve what you want through a combination of a new List Style and a Paragraph Style. Here’s how:

1) Create a new List style.

Go to the list palette, click on “Style” and go down to “New List Style”. In the dialog that comes up, you will give it a name, perhaps “Figures” (I named this “Figures 1” but that number is not necessary here, it comes in a moment), base it on “Numbered”, and click “Continued throughout document”.

2) Set the List Style parameters

Now, go back to the List Palette with Figures selected as the style, and set up its parameters. Item = 0 (that is, no first line indent/outdent from margin), Text = 0 (that is, no left indent from the margin), Before Text = type in “Figure” and a space (so there is a letter space between Figure and the number), and After Text = Delete the zero and type in a “:” . Okay, tab out.

Now that gives you a block of text with no indent, but you still have that automatic tab space. So lets APPEAR to get rid of that.

3) Make a Paragraph Style -- Figures 1

Go to the Style Sheet View, go to the Insert menu / New Style / Paragraph Style. Call this “Figures 1”. You’ll need the number because you are going to create at least one and perhaps two more of these.

Then go to the Lists Palette (NOT the lists listing which is part of the Style Sheet -- I always confuse this), click on Style: Figures, and it will change the sample text to your Figures style.

Now -- insert a normal left hand tab marker at a point in the ruler that gives you just a single space between the colon and the first letter.

Give it a keyboard shortcut if you like so you can implement it from the keyboard without having to go to the Styles Palette.

4) Make a Paragraph Styles -- Figures 2 (plus possibly Figures 3)

Still in the Style Sheet View, go AGAIN to the Insert menu / New Style / Paragraph Style. Call this “Figures 2”.

Set it to be “Based on” Figures 1 and all you have to do is set your tab to give you an extra letter spacing. This is to accommodate double digit numbers, i.e. 10 and above. If you are going to end up with more than 99 figures, then you’ll need a third Paragraph Style with a further letter space to accommodate the three digit number.

While these are separate Paragraph Styles, they are still the same List style, so shifting from one Paragraph Style to the next will not interrupt the number sequence.

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Now when you type your figure captions, you just apply the Figures 1 (or 2 or 3) Paragraph Style and it formats automatically.

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As you can see, this is a workaround and it has the disadvantage of most workarounds -- it can fall over if other parameters change. In this case, if you change fonts the spacing of your tabs might be wrong. For instance, I use Verdana for easy screen visibility, but generally print in Garamond or Caslon, which are much smaller, so the space left by the tab placement in the Figures 1,2 Paragraph Styles would be too wide.

However, you can correct this quickly if you do your font change in the Paragraph Styles. Change the font, shift the tab, and all paragraphs in that style will change accordingly.

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Martin -- is it possible to make that auto tab optional? I presume it is the trigger for the number, if so, can the trigger it be made optional, e.g. a tab, a return, a space, a punctuation mark? (Beware, though, if you go one small step, I want the whole moon~!)

Cheers, Geoff

Geoffrey Heard
Publisher, Editor, Business Writer
The Worsley Press

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[martin]

Martin -- is it possible to make that auto tab optional?

No, the automatic tab character is always present in any list items a list style produces.