Writer Guide

Selecting a language for a paragraph style
The language you select for a document (on Tools > Options >
Language Settings > Languages) determines the dictionary used for
spell checking, thesaurus, hyphenation, the decimal and thousands
delimiter used, and the default currency format.
Within the document, you can apply a separate language to any
paragraph style. This setting has priority over the language of the
whole document. On the Font page of the Paragraph Style dialog box,
languages with installed dictionaries are marked in the Language list
by a small ABC icon (Figure 226). When you check spelling, Writer will
use the correct dictionary for paragraphs with this style. If you write
documents in multiple languages, you can use the linked styles to
create two paragraph styles that differ only in the language option. If
you then want to change some of the other properties of the paragraph
style, all you need do is to change the parent style.
To insert occasional words in a different language and avoid their
being picked by mistake with the check-spelling function, it is more
convenient to use a character style.
Figure 226: Selecting a language for a paragraph style
Options for positioning text
The Position page of the Paragraph Style dialog box collects all the
options that affect the position of the text on the screen or printed
page. This page, shown in Figure 227, is divided into three sections,
plus a preview area. They are: Position , Rotation , and Scaling .
Use the Position section to control the appearance of superscripts and
subscripts. However, you will normally apply superscript and
subscripts to groups of characters rather than to entire paragraphs.
Therefore, it is strongly recommended to change these parameters
only when defining a character style and, instead, leave the default
settings for the paragraph styles.
232 OpenOffice.org 3 Writer Guide