View options
Two pages of options set the defaults for viewing Writer documents: View (described here) and Formatting Aids (described in the next section).
If the items on the OpenOffice.org Writer - View page are not self-explanatory, you can easily test their effects in a blank document.
This is a good page to check if, for example, you cannot see graphics on the screen or you see field codes instead of the text or numbers you are expecting.
Choosing View options for Writer