OpenOffice.org Writer Level 1 Course Material/LESSON 2: Editing a Document

LESSON 2: Editing a Document

Navigate a Document

You can use the scroll lock to navigate through a document. Use the Right scroll lock by click and drag to move a page up and down and the bottom scroll lock to move a page left and right.

Highlighting/Selecting Text

We are able to perform operations such as copying, deleting, move and formatting on entire block of text or paragraph by highlighting. However, before we can do so we need to select the text we wish to operate on. Usually we refer to this as highlighting the text. One way of highlighting text, is to position the cursor at the start or end of the text you wish to highlight. While at the start or end of the text holding down the shift key and use the navigation keys to move to the other end of the text you wish to highlight.

Copying and Moving Text

Then you can Delete, Move, Copy or format block of Text

To Move Text

1. Click Edit
2. Select Cut
3. Put cursor where you want to move the text to and then
4. Click Edit
5. Select paste

To Copy Text

1. Click Edit
2. Select Copy
3. Put cursor where you want to copy the text to and
4. Click Edit
5. Select Paste

Delete Blocks of Text

Select a block of text that you want to delete and press delete key from the keyboard. Block of text that was selected will be deleted.

Undo Changes

Undo command reverse the last action performed.

To Undo Using Menu Bar

1. Click Edit
2. Select Undo

Find and Replace Text

Writer has a Find and Replace feature that automates the process of searching for text inside a document. In addition to finding and replacing words and phrases, you can: * Use regular expressions (wildcards) to fine-tune a search (see the Help for details). * Find and replace specific formatting. * Find and replace paragraph styles.

To display the Find &Replace Dialog

1. Click Edit
2. SelectFind & Replace.
3. Type the text you want to find in textbox.
4. To replace the text with different text, type the new text in the Replace with box.
5. Click Find
6. Click yes from the dialog to start searching from the beginning
7. Click Replace instead. Tip: If you click Find All, OOo selects all instances of the search text in the document. Similarly, if you click Replace All, OOo will replace all matches. Caution: Use Replace All with caution; otherwise, you may end up with some hilarious (and highly embarrassing) mistakes. A mistake with Replace All might require a manual, word-by-word, search to fix.