Aligning Text in LibreOffice Writer
Ducks in a Row

© synell, 123RF.com
To get professional publishing results, here are a few tips and tricks to get the most out of LibreOffice Writer’s alignment options.
Just because an option in LibreOffice Writer is easy to choose does not mean that it is easy to use. Take, for example, alignment, or how characters are arranged between the left and the right margin on a line. A single click on the Alignment tab of a paragraph style will set the alignment to right, center, left (ragged right), or justified (i.e., evenly distributed between the margins). Yet to use any alignment takes design knowledge and, sometimes, extra effort as well (Figure 1).

Right Alignment
Aligning letters to the right margin is used the least. Right alignment is used only in layout, such as a title page. A basic rule of layout is that related information, such as the lines of a mailing address should have a common alignment. For instance, an address on a letter is traditionally right aligned. You often find a right alignment on a brochure or diagram as well. Generally, though, only a few lines in a document are likely to have a right alignment, for the simple reason that most European languages read from left to right, and an uneven left margin is harder to read and just looks wrong to most people.
Center Alignment
In the long gone, unlamented days of typewriters, titles were often center aligned, for the simple reason that the options for differentiating the title from the main text were few. Today, however, a title can easily be a different size or font, and a center alignment, like a right one, is only seen in more elaborate layouts.
Left vs. Justified Alignment
Left and justified alignments are the most common choices in layout. However, which one to use depends on the context.
For decades, left alignment was the default on typewriters. Only late model typewriters with a few kilobytes of memory ever managed justified lines. For the most part, industrial typesetting machines alone offered justification -- and even they often required manual tweaks to look their best. Consequently, in many people’s minds, justification is still the main indicator of professional design. Armed with this expectation, today many can be loudly scornful of left alignment.
However, for professional typographers, the choice is more complicated. To start with, the algorithms for justifying lines of text can be very poor, and heavy editing and revision can leave justified lines a mess with unsightly variations in the spaces between characters and words. You can see a small sample of the difficulties by investigating Writer’s options for the last line of a justified paragraph: Start (left-aligned), Center, and Justified. To be fair, some tools, including Writer, have improved greatly over the years, but, in others, users are better off avoiding justification altogether.
Yet even in Writer, justification is not always the best choice. Faced with short sentences, such as an instruction manual with numbered steps or a table with narrow columns, justification can struggle to produce a decent-looking page (Figure 2). Sometimes, a change of fonts, font size, or character spacing on the Position tab helps, but too often such modifications can compromise the overall look of the design by introducing too many changes in the default appearance. Sometimes, a left alignment may also be unsuitable (Figure 3), yet, by contrast, a left alignment tends to look better than justification, even before tweaking. Just as importantly, if a document will be frequently revised, then a left alignment can mean less maintenance. Besides, some designers will deliberately use a left alignment simply out of nostalgia for typewriters. Fortunately, the great advantage of word processors is that changes are easily made, so you can experiment until you find the best alignment for your purposes and aesthetics.


Buy Linux Magazine
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you've found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
The GNU Project Celebrates Its 40th Birthday
September 27 marks the 40th anniversary of the GNU Project, and it was celebrated with a hacker meeting in Biel/Bienne, Switzerland.
-
Linux Kernel Reducing Long-Term Support
LTS support for the Linux kernel is about to undergo some serious changes that will have a considerable impact on the future.
-
Fedora 39 Beta Now Available for Testing
For fans and users of Fedora Linux, the first beta of release 39 is now available, which is a minor upgrade but does include GNOME 45.
-
Fedora Linux 40 to Drop X11 for KDE Plasma
When Fedora 40 arrives in 2024, there will be a few big changes coming, especially for the KDE Plasma option.
-
Real-Time Ubuntu Available in AWS Marketplace
Anyone looking for a Linux distribution for real-time processing could do a whole lot worse than Real-Time Ubuntu.
-
KSMBD Finally Reaches a Stable State
For those who've been looking forward to the first release of KSMBD, after two years it's no longer considered experimental.
-
Nitrux 3.0.0 Has Been Released
The latest version of Nitrux brings plenty of innovation and fresh apps to the table.
-
Linux From Scratch 12.0 Now Available
If you're looking to roll your own Linux distribution, the latest version of Linux From Scratch is now available with plenty of updates.
-
Linux Kernel 6.5 Has Been Released
The newest Linux kernel, version 6.5, now includes initial support for two very exciting features.
-
UbuntuDDE 23.04 Now Available
A new version of the UbuntuDDE remix has finally arrived with all the updates from the Deepin desktop and everything that comes with the Ubuntu 23.04 base.