Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 67243
Merge & center toolbar button
Last modified: 2013-08-07 15:12:27 UTC
This is a follow-up for issue 33126. The 'Toggle Merge' button is nice - but having 'Toggle Merge & Center' would be even better ;-) The usual usage for the merge button is to create labels for tables etc. People tend to center them; and we should help them... This patch turns the 'Toggle Merge' functionality into 'Toggle Merge & Center', and adds menu entries for Merge (without centering) and Split - so that the people still have the chance to merge without centering. The patch is a bit more complex so that the undo & redo worked as expected as well. Please have a look - it would be great to be able to commit before the 2.0.4 deadline... Thank you in advance!
Created attachment 37672 [details] The patch.
I spend much of my time in Excel left-justifying merged cells- but I think I'm in the minority. I do the like the purity of OOo; I want to merge a cell, not change my text formatting. I also think the use of a toggle (vs 'split'), is logical and useful in communicating what is actually happening to the spreadsheet. However, if merge¢er is to be introduced, I feel it should fully replace Merge. I think multiple 'merge' menu entries are unnecessary. We should present the user with a consistent behaviour, so I assume this will also be changed in Writer? Regards, Andrew
Resetting the centering is simple - right click on the merged cell & selecting Default - the first choice there. I still think that the Merge & Center use case is more common ;-) - but I added the 'merge' menu entries for convenience. The 'merge' in Writer (in the tables) is something different - you can even create new cells by splitting a single cell, etc.; so I'm not sure that behave the same way as in Calc...
The current behavior was intended that way, see issue 20500. Changes to it should be discussed with User Experience first.
mmp: Can you comment on this, please? Thank you in advance!
changing owner... DR->MMP: Please return to me with your comments. As Niklas already stated, this issue is realated to issue 20500.
Generally I prefer to to change the "just merge" into "merge and center". We need to make sure, any side effects are covered. I briefly evaluated the current implementation of this patch (with a Novell OOo 2.0.4 build from Jan 12). The feature works as expected, but it does so initially only. What doesn't work yet: - The second use of the "merge & center" toolbar icon doesn't restore the original state. Instead, after breaking a merge apart, the first cell remains centered (but should be what it was before merging, or - in case a style was applied - what the default formatting for this style is). - The menu command toggle indicates "merged and centered" even if the cell is just merged and not centered. Instead, the command "Merge cells" should work as a toggle, too. If cells are just merged and not centered, the menu needs to show that. - The icon for "merge and center" needs to be changed, because the functionality has changed. Additionally, Writer offers the functionality to merge cells, too, and it uses this (old) icon already. - The menu should contain the new icon. So much about the existing functionality. What about the idea of making the menu button a drop-down button, offering the new functionality in addition to the old one? Plus, we can offer an additional one, that centers content not only horizontally, but vertically, too (in case multiple rows are selected). Just my 2 cents. Lutz.
> - The second use of the "merge & center" toolbar icon doesn't restore the > original state. Instead, after breaking a merge apart, the first cell remains > centered (but should be what it was before merging, or - in case a style was > applied - what the default formatting for this style is). Unfortunately, this is technically impossible. This is very similar to the situation when you merge cells that all have some text in - you are asked whether to make one string of all of them. If you gree and then use the 'toggle merge' again, the text stays merged in the first cell (this is the behavior in the up-stream package as well). What we could do is that with the second click on the 'merge & center', we would reset the alignment to default. > - The menu command toggle indicates "merged and centered" even if the cell is > just merged and not centered. Instead, the command "Merge cells" should work > as a toggle, too. If cells are just merged and not centered, the menu needs > to show that. The 'toggle merge' functionality was added later, when there already existed these 'merge' and 'split' commands (as shown in the menu). They are still available for UNO calls, so we would have to - Hide them again (as it is in the current up-stream packages), and let the 'toggle merge' as it is in the up-stream package (without the centering functionality) - Add the 3th way, 'toggle merge & center' - Show just 'toggle merge' and 'toggle merge & center' in the menu Do we want that? No problem to change the patch this way, of course. > - The icon for "merge and center" needs to be changed, because the > functionality has changed. Additionally, Writer offers the functionality to > merge cells, too, and it uses this (old) icon already. sts: Could you provide us with the new icon, please? > - The menu should contain the new icon. > So much about the existing functionality. What about the idea of making the > menu button a drop-down button, offering the new functionality in addition to > the old one? Could be. Here is the question what should be the default ;-) > Plus, we can offer an additional one, that centers content not only > horizontally, but vertically, too (in case multiple rows are selected). The attached implementation of 'toggle merge & center' centers in both directions (which is different from what the MS office does). Should I change it?
While waiting for MMP's comments, let me complicate things further: When thinking about additional buttons for horizontal or vertical actions, issue 8339 seems more important than the centering.
Re-assign to Frank Loehmann, who is still on vacation this week, but who in general works on Calc usability issues. Frank, please can you take care of this one? Given the long history (and of course the issue type patch), this issue should be dealt with rather sooner than later. Thanks.
I'm adding this comment to all open issues with Issue Type == PATCH. We have 220 such issues, many of them quite old. I apologize for that. We need your help in prioritizing which patches should be integrated into our next release, Apache OpenOffice 4.0. If you have submitted a patch and think it is applicable for AOO 4.0, please respond with a comment to let us know. On the other hand, if the patch is no longer relevant, please let us know that as well. If you have any general questions or want to discuss this further, please send a note to our dev mailing list: dev@openoffice.apache.org Thanks! -Rob