nisus.com

Hi,
I'm wanting to set up something that's standard in publishing: a full single page graphic, with the rest of the body text flowing before and after it, completely filling all the other pages.

I've tried various ways, and can't seem to get it to work. Is there some simple way?

To clarify:
I don't mean putting a 'page break' before and after my graphic page; because with text flow changes that will sometimes mean the break will end up leaving almost a full blank page in the text. What I mean is that the text always flows right up to the graphic and then right after it -- but the graphic is on a full page. This was common publishing practice when graphics were always separate 'color plates', and I'd like to reproduce this effect (though not for the same reason).

I've tried putting the graphic in a text box, inline, but it jumps around from page to page. And using the graphic by itself breaks the pages with large amounts of white space left.

Thanks

Steven Rowat

Hi Steven,

You say "full single page graphic", but mentioned placing it inline, so is it true that your graphic will stay entirely within the margins? Also, will your graphic always come after the same piece of document text? If both those are true, I'm wondering if you can't just place the graphic inline, as a separate paragraph. Or did you need text to wrap around the graphic (on the left/right sides)? Or do you require the graphic's position to be independent of which text gets placed on what page?

If you had a screenshot or example, it might help me understand better.

martin wrote:Hi Steven,

You say "full single page graphic", but mentioned placing it inline, so is it true that your graphic will stay entirely within the margins?

Yes, I can do that; I can change the size slightly, and make it full page within the margins.

martin wrote:Also, will your graphic always come after the same piece of document text? If both those are true, I'm wondering if you can't just place the graphic inline, as a separate paragraph.

The paragraph that REFERS to the graphic can be inline ("Blabbiddy blabbidy See Figure 6"). But the problem is that the graphic will be a FULL PAGE. There will be no room for any text on its page. I want the graphic to be near the reference paragraph (either the page facing it in the book, or on the next page following it). Yet I want the text (all the other pages) to flow without breaks. So I want the text to flow up to that graphic page, then jump over it and on past it, filling all the pages before and after it.

martin wrote:If you had a screenshot or example, it might help me understand better.

So far I just can't do it, so there's no reason to send; I have to explain. Perhaps you've seen old books, or even current art books, where there are pages that have only paintings or diagrams that fill the whole pages (within margins on the pages), and the text describing them is on other pages, and fills those pages? I can't achieve this. I end up with half-pages of blank white on the text pages in the various ways I've tried it.

Thanks for the extra explanation Steven. I think I understand what you're after now, and ideally I think you're looking for a feature like "always show this graphic on the page following the graphic's anchoring/reference paragraph" or even "always show this graphic on page #6 regardless". Unfortunately we don't have anything like that; Nisus Writer's floating graphics always show on the same page as the anchoring paragraph.

So even though you already mentioned that you don't want to use page breaks and manually manage how the text lands on each page, I think that's the only feasible option for a full page graphic like you want. Sorry about that.

martin wrote: So even though you already mentioned that you don't want to use page breaks and manually manage how the text lands on each page, I think that's the only feasible option for a full page graphic like you want. Sorry about that.

First, I request this feature, because it seems to me a common need (or, at least, occasional need) to have full pages of graphics that face across from a given paragraph in the text: "always show this graphic on the page facing the graphic's anchoring/reference paragraph."

Failing that feature for now, do you think that I'm right that my most direct workaround is the following:
1. Wait until the book has gone through its very final revisions and all the text that will need to flow is set.
2. On the page before I want the graphic page, break the final paragraph at the end of the line at the bottom of the page, and add a 'new page' break there.
3. On the next page, add a paragraph, and anchor my graphic that will take up the entire page.
4. On the page following the graphic, start a paragraph with the second half of the text paragraph broken in #2.
?

Steven Rowat

martin wrote: … Unfortunately we don't have anything like that; Nisus Writer's floating graphics always show on the same page as the anchoring paragraph.
…

Actually, Martin, I'm still having problems with files containing many small textboxes — like the one where I emailed you a screenshot from recently on a different question — where if I move a floating textbox containing a graphic though still on the same page, the anchor flips to the beginning of a paragraph on the previous page, and if I then move the anchor down to where it should be, the textbox flips down onto the page below. This doesn't happen all the time, and I have succeeded in finding a way round it when it does, but doing so can be quite time consuming.

I'll send you an example when it happens next.

Mark

Back on the original question, I think one of the problems for Steven Rowat and others who want this is that there is no way, as far as I can see, of inserting a page-break or section break and yet have the line immediately preceding it remain fully justified up to the right margin. In all of my experience, that line gets shortened as it would if it merely ended with a paragraph break.

I have seen other w-ps or software that can do both "Justified" as a normal paragraph, and "Fully Justified" for situations like this of breaking the page or inserting a page-width inline graphic as a new paragraph but retaining the full line length of the line immediately preceding it. Can I therefore put this forward, officially as it were, as a feature request for a future version.

Mark

xiamenese wrote: I have seen other w-ps or software that can do both "Justified" as a normal paragraph, and "Fully Justified" for situations like this of breaking the page or inserting a page-width inline graphic as a new paragraph but retaining the full line length of the line immediately preceding it. Can I therefore put this forward, officially as it were, as a feature request for a future version.
Mark

Thank you for pointing this out Mark. I'll second this request.

Steven

stevenrowat wrote:Failing that feature for now, do you think that I'm right that my most direct workaround is the following:
1. Wait until the book has gone through its very final revisions and all the text that will need to flow is set.
2. On the page before I want the graphic page, break the final paragraph at the end of the line at the bottom of the page, and add a 'new page' break there.
3. On the next page, add a paragraph, and anchor my graphic that will take up the entire page.
4. On the page following the graphic, start a paragraph with the second half of the text paragraph broken in #2.
?

That sounds like a decent plan to me. Two alternate strategies:

1. If you can keep the graphic as an inline graphic, just surround it with a page break before and after. That's going to be less trouble than a floating graphic.
2. If you need/want to use a floating graphic, use the steps you gave above, but in step #3 anchor the graphic to a page break instead of a newline.

xiamenese wrote:Back on the original question, I think one of the problems for Steven Rowat and others who want this is that there is no way, as far as I can see, of inserting a page-break or section break and yet have the line immediately preceding it remain fully justified up to the right margin. In all of my experience, that line gets shortened as it would if it merely ended with a paragraph break.

I have seen other w-ps or software that can do both "Justified" as a normal paragraph, and "Fully Justified" for situations like this of breaking the page or inserting a page-width inline graphic as a new paragraph but retaining the full line length of the line immediately preceding it. Can I therefore put this forward, officially as it were, as a feature request for a future version.

That's a request we have filed already I think, but I'll add your votes to it, thanks. I think the block is Apple's text engine, which doesn't have a "full justify" mode.

In the meantime, you can workaround the limitation using a macro. It's rather inconvenient, as you'll have to reapply the macro each time you'd like to re-justify your text, but it will work if you really need the feature. I'm attaching the macro here.

martin wrote: In the meantime, you can workaround the limitation using a macro. It's rather inconvenient, as you'll have to reapply the macro each time you'd like to re-justify your text, but it will work if you really need the feature. I'm attaching the macro here.

Thanks Martin.
I downloaded and tried both macros, and at first all I get is either an infinite loop or does nothing.

This was on a single paragraph in a new page, where the text was justified before I started, then broken in one line by adding a 'new page' symbol at the end of the last word in the line. In the loop one, it first adds spaces enough to fill to the right margin, and then merrily selects/blinks those spaces on and off every few seconds, but does nothing else. The AppleScript symbol keeps showing the whole time. I can leave by hitting the escape button, so it's not frozen.

Perhaps I need some guidance in how to use it? .

Steven

I don't think using the macro requires much thought: just select the line you'd like to fully justify and run the macro once. So perhaps there's something special about your text that's causing the failure. Would you be able to send me a snippet that reproduces the failed macro run? Thanks Steven.

martin wrote:I don't think using the macro requires much thought: just select the line you'd like to fully justify and run the macro once. So perhaps there's something special about your text that's causing the failure. Would you be able to send me a snippet that reproduces the failed macro run? Thanks Steven.

Thank you for the offer, but I tried it again with new text chunks, and it does work almost all the time on my second sample.
Then I realized that for a very small change, the macro is adding spaces unevenly (ie, adding a space to each of the first two word gaps in a ten word line, and not changing the rest,) which looked wonky.

Then I realized that I could probably do as well or better just by adjusting the Kerning; I tried this, and it works, and isn't visible.

So, as a workaround, I think the macro will be fine when there's a large gap to make-up, and kerning when it's small.

So I won't need to send a sample unless I run into a text break before a graphic that one of these can't handle.

Thanks....

Steven Rowat