Writer Guide

Creating frames
You can create a frame in several ways, depending on your needs.
• Choose Insert > Frame) to create an empty frame. The Frame dialog box
(Figure 117) appears. You can click OK and come back to customize it later, or
you can set the frame’s characteristics at this stage.
• Select text or a graphic, choose Insert > Frame, and click OK to create a
frame containing the selection. The selected text is automatically deleted from
the normal text flow and inserted into the frame, and the Frame dialog box
appears.
• Insert a picture or other object by selecting Insert > Picture > From file or
Insert > Object to start the process to insert a picture or object. The item
inserted automatically appears in a frame, but the Frame dialog box does not
appear.
• Use the Insert Frame Manually button on the Insert toolbar (go to
View > Toolbars > Insert to display it), select the number of frames in the
drop-down menu, and drag the mouse to draw the frame.
Figure 116: Using an icon on the Insert toolbar to create a frame
When you release the mouse button, a box appears where the
cursor is located in the document. This box represents the
frame: an area isolated from the main document.
To add content to a frame, first deselect the frame by clicking
somewhere else on the page. Then, click inside the frame so that the cursor shifts its
focus there. Now add content just like you would on the main page. When you are
done, deselect the frame.
Moving, resizing, and changing frame attributes
When an object is added to Writer, it is automatically enclosed in a frame of a
predetermined type. The frame sets how the object is placed on the page, as well as
how it interacts with other elements in the document. You can edit the frame by
modifying the frame style it uses or by using a manual override when a frame is
added to the document. Frame styles are discussed in Chapter 7 (Working with
Styles).
To change the size or location of a frame, first select the frame, then use either the
mouse or the Frame dialog box (Figure 117). Using the mouse is faster but less
accurate. You might want touse the mouse for gross layout and the dialog box for
fine-tuning.
Chapter 4 Formatting Pages 115