Document Editor menu bar options: Format

Options in the Format menu allow you to change the appearance of controls and sections in the Layout area, as well as the entire document. The options include the following:

• Format

• Properties

• Autostyle settings (Save Autostyle As and Apply Autostyle)

• Snap to Grid

• Order

• Nudge

• Align

• Size

• Distribute

• Control default settings (Set Control Defaults and Apply Control Defaults)

• Conditional Formatting

• Document Properties

When you are editing a Grid/Graph, the Format menu changes to provide some of the options available in the Report Editor. For more information, see Report Editor menu bar options: Format.

Format menu options

• Format: Accesses general formatting options such as font, borders, alignment, and number formats. Opens the Format Objects dialog box. This option is not available if a section is selected on the Layout area. See Formatting documents for more information.

• Properties: Accesses additional formatting options such as name, position, size, and hyperlinks, among others specific to the selected control. Opens the Properties dialog box. See Formatting documents for more information.

  The settings in the Format Objects and Properties dialog boxes are also available in the Property List pane.

• Save Autostyle As: Saves the document as an Autostyle, or predefined format. Save it in the /Public Objects/AutoStyles folder so that it will be available to the Document Wizard as an Autostyle. Opens the Save Autostyle dialog box.

• Apply Autostyle: Opens the Select Autostyle dialog box, allowing you to select an Autostyle (predefined format) to apply to the document.

  For more information on Autostyles, see Using predefined formats (Autostyles).

• Snap to Grid: Determines whether controls are aligned to the grid points. If this option is not selected, controls can be sized and positioned freely.

  Holding CTRL while moving the control temporarily disables snap to grid.

• Order: Sets which controls display in front of or behind others, when controls overlap. See Ordering controls on documents.

• Bring to Front and Send to Back move the control to the very front or back of the document.

• Use Bring Forward and Send Backward when three or more controls overlap and you want to incrementally bring one control forward or send it back, but not all the way to the front or back.

• Nudge: Moves the selected control slightly Up, Down, Left, or Right.

• Align: Lines up the selected controls in the selected direction:

  • Left aligns all selected controls with the leftmost control.

  • Center horizontally centers all selected controls.

  • Right aligns all selected controls with the rightmost control.

  • Top aligns all selected controls with the topmost control.

  • Middle vertically centers all selected controls.

  • Bottom aligns all selected controls with the lowest control.

  • To Grid aligns the upper left corner of all selected controls to the closest grid point.

For more information, see Aligning controls on documents.

• Size: Automatically resizes multiple controls to a uniform size:

  • To Grid resizes and moves the control so that all corners touch a grid point.

    To Grid is also available when a single control is selected.

  • To Tallest changes the height of the selected controls to that of the tallest one.

  • To Shortest changes the height of the selected controls to that of the shortest one.

  • To Widest changes the width of the selected controls to that of the widest one.

  • To Narrowest changes the width of the selected controls to that of the narrowest one.

For more information, see Sizing controls on documents.

• Distribute: Evenly positions or spaces multiple controls.

  • Horizontal evenly spaces the selected controls across the width of the page.

  • Vertical evenly spaces the selected controls along the length of the page.

  • Relative to Layout distributes the controls relative to the size of the layout, rather than relative to each other.

At least three controls must be selected for Distribute to become available. For more information, see Distributing controls on documents.

• Set Control Defaults: Makes the formatting of the selected control the default for that type of control (text field, section, and so on). That is, any new controls you create will have the same formatting settings.

• Apply Control Defaults: Applies the formatting of the control default to the selected control.

For more information on control defaults, see Formatting controls using control defaults.

• Conditional Formatting: Opens the Conditional Formatting dialog box, allowing you to add conditional formatting (similar to thresholds in reports) to the selected section. For more information, see Formatting conditional values in documents.

• Document Properties: Opens the Properties - Document Properties dialog box, allowing you to set properties for the whole document, such as the default grid autostyle, the initial display mode for MicroStrategy Web, document caching, and export options, as well as creating a table of contents. You can also specify properties for the current layout of a multi-layout document, including the background color and border, which document sections to display, and the layout name. (If the document does not contain multiple layouts, these properties apply to the document as a whole.) See Formatting documents for more information.

Related Topics

• Formatting documents

• Using predefined formats (Autostyles)

• Ordering controls on documents

• Aligning controls on documents

• Sizing controls on documents

• Distributing controls on documents

• Formatting controls using control defaults

• Formatting conditional values in documents

• Document Editor