Complete noob: how do I program which "section" I am in?

[PelesDaughter]

Hi folks. I was just informed by someone at the LibreOffice forums that my book that I have been formatting in Writer for weeks can't be completed in Writer due to it being a "page-oriented" rather than "flow-oriented" book (for more details, stemming from the original issue which has been my PDFs inserted as images being cut off at the top, you can read that conversation here: https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/kdp-cutting-off-the-top-of-an-an-image-that-is-formatted-fine-in-writer-possibly-related-to-a-table-appearing-with-a-padding-even-though-i-set-it-to-0-which-is-another-issue/109492/10)

I was able to learn somewhere else about Sections, which seem to be much easier to manage than Libre's Styles, but I haven't figured out how to, well, select which section each page is considered within.

Thank you for your advice.

[sersha]

The advice which was given to you in LO forum is absolutely correct. Scribus, or any other page layout program, is a must when you want to have a perfect control over the placement of anything on the page.
If you ever plan to do a similar job in the future, consider studying Scribus as a good investment.
Having said that, I looked at your document, and, since you want to keep this book in the wordprocessor format, I would suggest as a workaround, to increase the size of your PDF insert by adding a white margin of a proper size, just enough to avoid the cutting off the top of the chart. I added some space on the top in the enclosed file, so that might help.
Otherwise, as I said before, write and proofread your text in a wordprocessor, make your illustrations in an editor of your choice, when all is ready, use Scribus to assemble a perfect PDF for printing.
Good luck!
S.

[a.l.e]

I don't see why you should not be able to do that in LibreOffice.

I don't have the details, but I would create a frame that is anchored at the top of the page and inside of it, add the table and the image anchored as character.

I have attached a sample .odt file.

Sadly, bot Writer and Word tend to insert things as floating items, but if you want to have some control on where things will be, it's often useful to insert them as a character.

All that being said, depending on the content of your document, you will be  better served by LibreOffice or Scribus.
If you want to do a good layout, both having some learning curve.
Scribus needing more learning, Writer requesting more attention to avoid bad defaults (and pick the right features).
(Yes, I had to fight a bit to get the "simple" result in the attached .odt and, at the end, I don't know why it finally worked correctly).

[PelesDaughter]

The advice which was given to you in LO forum is absolutely correct. Scribus, or any other page layout program, is a must when you want to have a perfect control over the placement of anything on the page.
If you ever plan to do a similar job in the future, consider studying Scribus as a good investment.
Having said that, I looked at your document, and, since you want to keep this book in the wordprocessor format, I would suggest as a workaround, to increase the size of your PDF insert by adding a white margin of a proper size, just enough to avoid the cutting off the top of the chart. I added some space on the top in the enclosed file, so that might help.
Otherwise, as I said before, write and proofread your text in a wordprocessor, make your illustrations in an editor of your choice, when all is ready, use Scribus to assemble a perfect PDF for printing.
Good luck!
S.

Thank you for your response and suggestion. The problem with adding more space at the top of the image, though, is that the content is already just barely fitting, and only because I have been cutting out parts of the already whittled text for which there is very limited space (I am not willing to go any lower with font size.

I can see this working if I resize the pdf-image to be smaller on the width axis, though. So, I will potentially attempt this. I have already started on re-doing everything in Scribus, which is why I asked my original question about Sections, so that I can assign page numbers properly (without which there can be no book).

[PelesDaughter]

I don't see why you should not be able to do that in LibreOffice.

I don't have the details, but I would create a frame that is anchored at the top of the page and inside of it, add the table and the image anchored as character.

I have attached a sample .odt file.

Sadly, bot Writer and Word tend to insert things as floating items, but if you want to have some control on where things will be, it's often useful to insert them as a character.

All that being said, depending on the content of your document, you will be  better served by LibreOffice or Scribus.
If you want to do a good layout, both having some learning curve.
Scribus needing more learning, Writer requesting more attention to avoid bad defaults (and pick the right features).
(Yes, I had to fight a bit to get the "simple" result in the attached .odt and, at the end, I don't know why it finally worked correctly).

Thanks for your response. It's not clear to me what you mean by that I would be "better served by LibreOffice or Scribus" because those are the two programs that I have bee using, Libre for the past month, and Scribus for one day.

I didn't know about Anchoring, and I see it's a thing now, but I'm not sure how using that would help solve what I'm facing. Though I don't know if it was intentional, your example document does bring up an issue that had been arising but that I just ignored when I couldn't solve it, that of there being "space" underneath the text in the table at the top of the second page (the time/date and town name). Even with no "padding" all of the tables came up that way, basically taking an entire line extra away from my arrangement.

You're saying you don't know how it finally worked speaks to what I have been encountering with Libre, a sort of inherent trickster energy that others have referenced with different words specifically in regard to the Styles function (https://forum.openoffice.org/en/forum/viewtopic.php?f=71&t=44607)

that brings me back to my original inquiry, which is, how do I assign a page to a certain section, or set which sections contain which pages? I've already started transferring the book to Scribus, though all of the information here is very helpful and useful. I am determined to get this book out in two weeks, and so while I don't have time to master two or even one program, somehow I am going to find a way to make everything "good enough." It's my first book, so I don't expect complete perfection, just basically that everything looks satisfactory and ready for sale.

Though, you are right. I don't see why this can't be done in Libre either. But I've already started migrating, and what I see that is it's in my best interest to continue moving forward rather than backtracking at this point, especially since the page-oriented nature of the book is better suited to Scribus.

[a.l.e]

in scribus the sections are defined in "file > document setup > sections".

it's in there that you assign page ranges to sections.

[PelesDaughter]

Well jeez, I feel really dunce now. The reason that I didn't see that before is because I set up the "sections" before I began doing anything else, and I didn't see anywhere to set the pages at that time (because there was nothing there to be automatically fed into the form, I guess)

Thanks. I'm going to go whip myself with a noodle now.

[AdmFubar]

What was used to create this image? The issue is with the image itself. I think how it was put together might be the issue.


My suspicions are right. Loaded the image into inkscape and exported it as a .png. Replaced the image on the .odt file you provided, and there is no cut off portion in the pdf generated by LO.

[PelesDaughter]

What was used to create this image? The issue is with the image itself. I think how it was put together might be the issue.


My suspicions are right. Loaded the image into inkscape and exported it as a .png. Replaced the image on the .odt file you provided, and there is no cut off portion in the pdf generated by LO.

That is so interesting.

It's generated by Solar Fire 9, one of the industry standard professional Astrology programs. I was advised to export it as a PDF because the JPG was pixelated and unreadable even at 300 dpi (there are 5 options: bmp, wmf, jpg, gif, and pdf).

It's good to know that there's another potential workaround. I wonder how the pdf-to-png would show up on the KDP proof.

My plan is to do a trial run from Scribus with one of the pages with a chart image, with the PDF copies I have already, and see if that works. If it doesn't, then I'll have to give it a go with your method. Thanks.

[PelesDaughter]

What was used to create this image? The issue is with the image itself. I think how it was put together might be the issue.


My suspicions are right. Loaded the image into inkscape and exported it as a .png. Replaced the image on the .odt file you provided, and there is no cut off portion in the pdf generated by LO.

Update: so, I tried your suggestion (downloaded and installed Inkscape, and exported the PDF as PNG, then inserted it into my Scribus doc), and lo and behold...it's cut off there too, but this time on the bottom!!!  Any ideas as to why and how to rectify?

[PelesDaughter]

What was used to create this image? The issue is with the image itself. I think how it was put together might be the issue.


My suspicions are right. Loaded the image into inkscape and exported it as a .png. Replaced the image on the .odt file you provided, and there is no cut off portion in the pdf generated by LO.

Update: so, I tried your suggestion (downloaded and installed Inkscape, and exported the PDF as PNG, then inserted it into my Scribus doc), and lo and behold...it's cut off there too, but this time on the bottom!!!  Any ideas as to why and how to rectify?

What was used to create this image? The issue is with the image itself. I think how it was put together might be the issue.


My suspicions are right. Loaded the image into inkscape and exported it as a .png. Replaced the image on the .odt file you provided, and there is no cut off portion in the pdf generated by LO.

Update: so, I tried your suggestion (downloaded and installed Inkscape, and exported the PDF as PNG, then inserted it into my Scribus doc), and lo and behold...it's cut off there too, but this time on the bottom!!!  Any ideas as to why and how to rectify?

For some reason the image I added isn't showing. It's here:

https://ibb.co/hgcbdRc

[PelesDaughter]

I believe that I've discovered the problem: Inkscape appears to have automatically cropped it. I'm also reaching out on the Inkscape forums for help on this.



https://ibb.co/bFDtnny

[PelesDaughter]

I believe that I've discovered the problem: Inkscape appears to have automatically cropped it. I'm also reaching out on the Inkscape forums for help on this.



https://ibb.co/bFDtnny

Looks like I'm banned from the forums before I could even post, due to what I think was that I posted an external link after not reading the rules thoroughly. I reached out in the chat for help, but, wow, this is getting really complex now 

[PatJr]

Can you post up a sample file?

[PelesDaughter]

Can you post up a sample file?

I was able to get help that resulted in a successful solution from the chat over there, but thanks so much.