Ducks in a Row

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).

Figure 1: LibreOffice Writer offers four alignment choices.

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.

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