Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for tables

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itexnz
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Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for tables

Unread post by itexnz »

Deselecting Keep Paragraph with next does not seem to be honored when the paragraph in question has a table

E.g. I want point 3 in the following example to not always stick to the same page as the previous paragraph
2018-07-05_16-37-27.png
I have many other examples of this in multiple projects where deselecting the option does not work, if the "paragraph" in question is a table. I've tried deselecting the option in individual cells and the paragraph that the table is inserted all with no luck.
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Re: Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for table

Unread post by Tim Green »

You are probably trying to set this in the last paragraph inside the table, which won't work, because that isn't the paragraph before the next paragraph after the table. The paragraph you need to set is the one containing the table. To set that you need to click to the right of the table, so that the insertion point is in the position after the table. Then you can format that paragraph.

Alternatively, you can also place the insertion point in the very last character in the last cell of the table and then press the right cursor arrow ONCE. Or put it in the very first character of the following character and press the left cursor arrow ONCE.
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Re: Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for table

Unread post by itexnz »

Hi yes Tim that's what I've tried, the cursor is definitely flashing outside the table but in the paragraph that the table is contained in. No joy. I have to work around it by inserting as manual page break instead
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Re: Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for table

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hang on, I just realized you are talking about DEactivating Keep with Next. You can't expect that to have any positive effect: Turning it on keeps things together, but turning it off does not do anything active. You are expecting it to create a page break. It doesn't work like that. It only does something active when it's on. When it's off it does nothing.
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Re: Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for table

Unread post by itexnz »

Admittedly I have a very unorthodox default paragraph setup Tim :oops:

I have all my default "normal" paragraphs configured to keep with next, and only manually deselect that option where I am certain I don't mind if the next paragraph appears on another page. It sounds crazy but I find that is the best way to ensure that I can edit documentation and be reasonably certain that the resulting published paged outputs will look just the way I want, without needing publish>check>edit>republish>rechecking cycles.

You see, I hate manuals where a subject under a sub-heading starts on a page and unnecessarily spans over to another page (but where I also do not want heading2/3 to always start on a new page). This insane sounding way I do things tends to work really well, at least for me, in that I'd rather the end of the previous page has a lot of whitespace in order that the next page has related paragraphs sticking together all on one page, but at the same time avoiding adding manual page breaks everywhere, which require a lot of that publish>check>edit>republish>rechecking after making changes to documentation!

I clearly have OCD issues - not a bad thing for a documentation writer though lol

I have tried the working the 'normal' way, but tend to find that if my default paragraph style is NOT set to keep with next, then I have to add a lot more manual page breaks and have to do a lot more manual checks for multiple paragraphs that needlessly and distractingly span pages.

This is admittedly a very edge-case situation that most users would not find... but still might be worth investigating?

Thanks anyway for entertaining my cuckoo questions lol
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Re: Do not Keep Paragraph with next is not honored for table

Unread post by Tim Green »

I have all my default "normal" paragraphs configured to keep with next,
If it's working for you then okay (kind of), but that is actually a formatting error. In principle you should never set keep with next on body text styles. It should only be set on things like headings that appear once and are immediately followed by another paragraph with a different style. If all the paragraphs in a sequence have keep with next you will create an unbreakable block of text that cannot go anywhere. Generally, all it can do is run off the bottom of the page, and it frequently does. So if you are making it work then that is fine for you, and you must be managing to avoid this problem with extreme manual attention to formatting detail. 8)
This is admittedly a very edge-case situation that most users would not find... but still might be worth investigating?
Not really, because everything is working as it should. This is more than an edge case, it is the intentional use of formatting errors to achieve a specific aim. That's a hack, which is fine, but it also means that you are responsible for the entire kit and caboodle. :twisted:
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