Pasting text

Text may be inserted into the text box by copying it from another document and pasting it into Impress. However, the pasted text will probably not match the formatting of the surrounding text or that of the other slides in the presentation. This may be what you want on some occasions, however in most cases you want to make sure that the presentation does not become a patchwork of different paragraph styles, font types, bullet points and so on. There are several ways to ensure consistency; these methods are explained below.

Pasting unformatted text

It is normally good practice to paste text without formatting and apply the formatting later. To paste without formatting, either press Control+Shift+V and then select Unformatted text from the dialog box that appears, or click on the small black triangle next to the paste symbol in the standard toolbar and select Unformatted text. The unformatted text will be formatted with the outline style at the cursor position in an AutoLayout text box or with the default graphic style in a normal text box.

Formatting pasted text

If pasting the text into an AutoLayout area, then to give the pasted text the same look and feel of the rest of the presentation apply the appropriate outline style to the text. To do so:

1. Paste the text in the desired position. Do not worry if it does not look right: it will in a minute.
2. Select the text you have just pasted (see Selecting text for details on how to do that).
3. Select Format > Default formatting from the menu bar.
4. Use the four arrow buttons in the Text Formatting toolbar to move the text to the appropriate position and give it the appropriate outline level. The button with the arrow pointing left promotes the list entry by one level (for example from Outline 3 to Outline 2), the right arrow button demotes the list entry by one level, the up and down arrow buttons move the list entry.
5. Apply manual formatting as required to sections of the text (to change font attributes, tabs, and so on).

If you are pasting text in a text box, you can still use styles to quickly format the text. Note that one and only one graphic style can be applied to the copied text. To do that:

1. Paste the text in the desired position.
2. Select the text you have just pasted (see Selecting text for details).
3. Select the desired graphic style.
4. Apply manual formatting as required to sections of the text.

Presentation styles are very different from Writer styles and are applied in quite a different way. Refer to Using styles to format text for details.