I'm working on a script that applies custom headings to a plain text document imported in Google Docs. The scripts works pretty much as it should. However the resulting document has a weird layout, as if random page breaks were inserted here and there. But there are no page breaks and I can't understand the reason of this layout. Checking the paragraph attributes give me no hints on what is wrong.
Here is the text BEFORE the script is applied:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MzFvlkG13i3rrUcz5jmmSppG4sBH6zTXr7RViwdqaIo/edit?usp=sharing
You can make a copy of the document and execute the script (from the Scripts menu, choose Apply Headings). The script applies the appropriate heading to the scene heading, name of the character, dialogue, etc.
As you can see, at the bottom of page 2 and 3 of the resulting document there is a big gap and I can't figure out why. The paragraph attributes seem ok to me...
Here is a copy of the script:
// Apply headings to sceneheadings, actions, characters, dialogues, parentheticals
// to an imported plain text film script;
function ApplyHeadings() {
var pars = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody().getParagraphs();
for(var i=0; i<pars.length; i++) {
var par = pars[i];
var partext = par.getText();
var indt = par.getIndentStart();
Logger.log(indt);
if (indt > 100 && indt < 120) {
var INT = par.findText("INT.");
var EXT = par.findText("EXT.");
if (INT != null || EXT != null) {
par.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING1);
par.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
}
else {
par.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.NORMAL);
par.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
}
}
else if (indt > 245 && indt < 260) {
par.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING2);
par.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
}
else if (indt > 170 && indt < 190) {
par.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING3);
par.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
}
else if (indt > 200 && indt < 240) {
par.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING4);
par.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
}
}
}
// Reset all the attributes to "null" apart from HEADING;
function ResetAttributes() {
var style = {};
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.STRIKETHROUGH] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.HORIZONTAL_ALIGNMENT] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.INDENT_START] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.INDENT_END] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.INDENT_FIRST_LINE] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.LINE_SPACING] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.ITALIC] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.FONT_SIZE] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.FONT_FAMILY] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.BOLD] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.SPACING_BEFORE] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.SPACING_AFTER] = null;
return style;
}
A couple of screenshots to make the problem more clear.
This is page 2 of the document BEFORE the script is applied.
This is page two AFTER the script is applied. Headings are applied correctly but... Why the white space at the bottom?
Note: if you manually re-apply HEADING2 to the first paragraph of page 3 (AUDIO TV), the paragraph will jump back to fill the space at the bottom of page 2. This action, however, doesn't change any attribute in the paragraph. So why the magic happens?
Thanks a lot for your patience.
That was an interesting problem ;-)
I copied your doc, ran the script and had a surprise : nothing happened !
It took me a few minutes to realize that the copy I just made had no style defined for headings, everything was for some reason in courrier new 12pt, including the headings.
I examined the log and saw the indent values, played with that a lot to finally see that the headings were there but not changing the style.
So I went in the doc menu and set 'Use my default style and... everything looks fine, see screen capture below.
So now your question : it appears that there must be something wrong in your style definition, by "wrong" I mean something that changes more than just the font Style and size but honestly I can't see any way to guess what since I'm unable to reproduce it... Please try resetting your heading styles and re-define your default.... and tell us what happens then.
PS : here are my default heading styles : (and the url of my copy in view only :https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yP0RRCrRSsQc9zCk-sdfu5olNGDkoIrabXanII4qUG0/edit?usp=sharing )
Related
I am looking to replace a string within a Google Doc via an app script. The string will exist on a line, but after the replace, I want it to have a specific font, size and justification.
I've created a style to address all these attributes (I included both Horiz. and Vert. alignment) and most of it works fine. When the string is replaced, the replacement has the right font, size and bold attributes. For some reason, I cannot get the justification to get changed.
// Define the style for the replacement string.
var hdrStyle = {};
hdrStyle[DocumentApp.Attribute.HORIZONTAL_ALIGNMENT] =
DocumentApp.HorizontalAlignment.CENTER;
hdrStyle[DocumentApp.Attribute.VERTICAL_ALIGNMENT] =
DocumentApp.VerticalAlignment.CENTER;
hdrStyle[DocumentApp.Attribute.FONT_FAMILY] = 'Calibri';
hdrStyle[DocumentApp.Attribute.FONT_SIZE] = 24;
hdrStyle[DocumentApp.Attribute.BOLD] = true;
{ then later }
documentBody = DocumentApp.openById(fileId).getBody();
hdrElem = documentBody.findText("old string").getElement();
hdrText = hdrElem.asText().setText("new string");
// Force our 'header style':
hdrElem.setAttributes(hdrStyle);
I've tried setting the style after the findText and (as here) after, but no change in centering.
I see there is a paragraph centering, but I am not clear how to 'get' the paragraph associated with the element that is returned on the find.
I'm hoping this is some simple set of calls - but have run out of ideas (and patience)..!
Any help would be appreciated!
You can use getParent() on hdrElem to get the parent paragraph to apply the styling to.
https://developers.google.com/apps-script/reference/document/text#getParent()
documentBody = DocumentApp.openById(fileId).getBody();
hdrElem = documentBody.findText("old string").getElement();
hdrText = hdrElem.asText().setText("new string");
var hdrParent = hdrElem.getParent()
// Force our 'header style':
hdrParent.setAttributes(hdrStyle);
I wonder how to set the text "Highlight" of a part of text inside tlfTextField with the code?
I tried "tf.backgroundColor = 0x990000" property, but did not help.
For instance, I can change the Font Color of any contents inside Parenthesis, by this code:
private function decorate():void {
var tf:TextFormat = new TextFormat();
tf.color = 0x990000;
var startPoint:int = 0;
while (startPoint != -1) {
var n1:int = textMc.tlfText.text.indexOf("(", startPoint);
var n2:int = textMc.tlfText.text.indexOf(")", n1 + 1);
if (n1 == -1 || n2 == -1) {
return;
}
textMc.tlfText.setTextFormat(tf, n1 + 1, n2);
startPoint = n2 + 1;
}
}
So I know "tf.color = 0x990000;" will change the Font color, however, don't know how to "highlight" some text, with code, as I do inside Flash manually.
You should have probably used tlfMarkup property to set the required format to the specific part of text. The attributes you seek are backgroundColor and backgroundAlpha of the span XML element that you should wrap your selection, however it should be much more difficult should there already be spans around words when you retrieve the property from your text field.
The problem with your solution is that you don't check if the two characters are located on a single line before drawing your rectangle, also you would need to redraw such rectangles each time something happens with the textfield. The proposed approach makes use of Flash HTML renderer's capabilities to preserve the formatting, however it will require a lot of work to handle this task properly.
I have a 20 line script, and I want to make sure that each paragraph is indented exactly once.
function myFunction() {
/*
This function turns the document's format into standard MLA.
*/
var body = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody();
body.setFontSize(12); // Set the font size of the contents of the documents to 9
body.setForegroundColor('#000000');
body.setFontFamily("Times New Roman");
// Loops through paragraphs in body and sets each to double spaced
var paragraphs = body.getParagraphs();
for (var i = 3; i < paragraphs.length; i++) { // Starts at 3 to exclude first 4 developer-made paragraphs
var paragraph = paragraphs[i];
paragraph.setLineSpacing(2);
// Left align the first cell.
paragraph.setAlignment(DocumentApp.HorizontalAlignment.LEFT);
// One indent
paragraph.editAsText().insertText(0, "\t"); // Adds one tab every time
}
var bodyText = body.editAsText();
bodyText.insertText(0, 'February 3, 1976\nMrs. Smith\nYour Name Here\nSocial Studies\n');
bodyText.setBold(false);
}
The code I have tried doesn't work. But my expected results are that for every paragraph in the for loop in myFunction(), there are exactly 4 spaces before the first word in each paragraph.
Here is a sample: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sMztzhOehzheRdqumC6PLnvk4qJgUCSE0irjTZ0FjTQ/edit?usp=sharing
If the user uses Autoformat, but already has the paragraphs indented...
Update
I have investigated use of the Paragraph.setIndentFirstLine() method. When I set it to four, it sets it to 1 space. Now I realize this is because points and spaces are not the same thing. What number do I need to multiply by to get four spaces in points?
Let us consider a few basic identing operations: manual and by script.
The following image shows how to indent current paragraph (cursor stays inside this one).
Please note, the units are centimetres. Also note, that the paragraph does not include leading spaces or tabs, we have no need of them.
Suppose we would like to get the indent values in the script and apply them to the next paragraph. Look at the code below:
function myFunction() {
var ps = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody().getParagraphs();
// We work with the 5-th and 6-th paragraphs indeed
var iFirst = ps[5].getIndentFirstLine();
var iStart = ps[5].getIndentStart();
var iEnd = ps[5].getIndentEnd();
Logger.log([iFirst, iStart, iEnd]);
ps[6].setIndentFirstLine(iFirst);
ps[6].setIndentStart(iStart);
ps[6].setIndentEnd(iEnd);
}
If you run and look at the log, you will see something like this: [92.69291338582678, 64.34645669291339, 14.173228346456694]. No surprise, we have typographic points instead of centimetres. (1cm=28.3465pt) So we can measure and modify any paragraph indent values precisely.
Addition
For some reasons you might want to control spaces number at the beginning of the paragraph. It is also possible by scripting, but it has no effect on the paragraph's "left" or "right" indents.
Sample code below is for similar task: count leading spaces number of the 5-th paragraph and make the same number of spaces at the beginning of the next one.
function mySpaces() {
var ps = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody().getParagraphs();
// We work with the 5-th and 6-th paragraphs indeed
var spacesCount = getLeadingSpacesCount(ps[5]);
Logger.log(spacesCount);
var diff = getLeadingSpacesCount(ps[6]) - spacesCount;
if (diff > 0) {
ps[6].editAsText().deleteText(0, diff - 1);
} else if (diff < 0) {
var s = Array(1 - diff).join(' ');
ps[6].editAsText().insertText(0, s);
}
}
function getLeadingSpacesCount(p) {
var found = p.findText("^ +");
return found ? found.getEndOffsetInclusive() + 1 : 0;
}
We have used methods deleteText() and insertText() of the class Text for proper corrections and findText() to locate the spaces if any. Note, the last method argument is a string, representing a regular expression. It matches "all leading spaces", if they exist. See more details about regular expression syntax.
I'm writing a script that picks the paragraph where the cursor is contained, set the text to uppercase and change the paragraph heading to HEADING1.
However, the paragraph is set to the 'global' HEADING1, not to HEADING1 as it is defined in the current document. Here is the code.
function SetSceneHeading() {
var cursor = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getCursor();
var element = cursor.getElement();
var paragraph = [];
if (element.getType() != 'PARAGRAPH') {
paragraph = element.getParent().asParagraph();
}
else paragraph = element.asParagraph();
var txt = paragraph.getText();
var TXT = txt.toUpperCase();
paragraph.setText(TXT);
paragraph.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING1);
}
Is there a way to set a paragraph to the 'current' HEADING1? Thanks.
I found a workaroud to set a paragraph to a user defined heading. Basically, you first set the heading using setHeading(), then you set to "null" the attributes that the previous operation messed up. This way the paragraph is set according to the user defined heading.
function MyFunction ()
var paragraph = ....
paragraph.setHeading(DocumentApp.ParagraphHeading.HEADING1);
paragraph.setAttributes(ResetAttributes());
function ResetAttributes() {
var style = {};
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.FONT_SIZE] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.BOLD] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.SPACING_BEFORE] = null;
style[DocumentApp.Attribute.SPACING_AFTER] = null;
return style;
}
I made a few tests, FONT_SIZE BOLD SPACING_BEFORE SPACING_AFTER seem to be the attributes that need to be reset. They may be more, according to the cases.
Unfortunately it seems that this won't be possible for now, there is an open issue that I think is relevant : issue 2373 (status acknowledged) , you could star it to get informed of any enhancement.
I am having a hard time. I have a document, which is a series of Paragraphs and Tables. Sometimes, I need to remove the last paragraph of the document and I would like to do so without leaving any empty whitespace.
Currently, I am getting this error:
Can't remove the last paragraph in a document section.
Does anyone know why this is happening? Is there a workaround?
Try this approach, it seems to work as expected, at least I didn't succeed to make it fail ;-)
function deleteAllParagraphs() {
var doc = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody();
doc.insertParagraph(0, '');// insert a dummy paragraph at the beginning of the doc that we are going to let there
doc.appendParagraph('');// append another dummy in case doc is empty
for(var p=doc.getNumChildren();p>=0;p--){
try{
doc.getChild(p).removeFromParent();
}catch(e){}
}
}
EDIT : from the issue tracker I found a better code suggested by #11 cyberaxe
that I slightly modified :
function emptyDocument() {
var document = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument();
var body = document.getBody();
body.appendParagraph('');// to be sure to delete the last paragraph in case it doesn't end with a cr/lf
while (body.getNumChildren() > 1) body.removeChild( body.getChild( 0 ) );
}
Super late to the party, but it doesn't look like this issue is resolved yet. I used the clear and merge functions to remove any whitespace only paragraphs at the end.
var paragraphs = DocumentApp.getActiveDocument().getBody().getParagraphs();
for (var i=paragraphs.length-1; i>=0; i--){
var line = paragraphs[i];
if (line.getText().trim() ) {
break;
}
else {
line.clear();
line.merge();
}
}