I have customized the ruler in a prototype to have two tab stops (one at 0.5 inches and one at 1.25 inches). When I create a new note with that prototype, the note’s ruler has the default four tab stops. Do prototypes not include rulers?
In short no. Detailed RTF styling is not part of the inheritance infrastructure, as far as a I know. But if I set tab stops—in the prototype’s text area ruler or via $Tabs the tab settings are inherited.
When applying a prototype to a note with no existing text and with the ruler showing you may need to de-select and re-select the note to refresh the rule to show the true settings.
BUT, local $Text styling trumps note level setting. Meaning? The moment you start editing $Text all $Text-related values are now as at that time and no longer inherit. If you apply your prototype to a note that already has text the prototype’s tabs have no effect as existing text has a ruler set. It may not be what you want but that’s how the system works.
To asserts the prototype’s $Tabs tab setting on existing text you needs to select all $Text and apply menu Format ▸ Style → ‘Reset Margins’.
Does your prototype set $Tabs? I believe $Tabs overrides the text settings if the new note has no text.
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Our answers, collided. But, I actually tested this in v9.1.0. Further to my above, a hidden aspect of Reset Margins is it has no effect if there is no selection. Also, ruler styles (e.g. including tabs) apply at paragraph script. IOW, one or more paragraphs, but never part of a paragraph.
So, if you want to reset only for additional new text, add a space, select that and only then apply Reset Margins. The fact a new (empty) line appears to use the previous paragraph’s ruler is an affordance based on a presumption you wish to continue using the current style. The counter-intuitive part is knowing how to set a new ruler for a new paragraph. You can’t, at least not until it has (some) content; in that way code and human thought don’t align.
Also, oddly amongst format controls ‘Reset Margins’ has no shortcuts. I find that to ‘clean’ a note’s format I need to apply both ‘Standard Font’ and ‘Reset Margins’. It’s a shame there’s no short cut to do both—even better if it could be applied to the note without having to select anything first. That way you could fix 00s of notes at once. Once ‘bad’ formatting slips into a big document it can be a real chore to weed out due to the lack of options that work at note(s) scope.
Thank you both very much! I didn’t think to look for $Tabs as an attribute. I set this as a Rule in the prototype and now my new notes using that prototype have the tabs at the desired locations.
You shouldn’t need to use a rule, actually; just set the value of $Tabs, and new instances will inherit that value.
That makes sense. Thank you very much, Mark.