Formatting Text
LayOut offers flexible text formatting at both the character and paragraph levels, as well as settings shared by both. Shared options include bolding, italicizing, and changing text color. Character-specific formatting handles features like superscripts and subscripts, while paragraph-specific formatting controls horizontal alignment, vertical anchoring, and line spacing.
Through formatting, your document can use the fonts and colors of your corporate branding, and make your text attractive and more readable.
You can select text formatting both before and after creating text in your document. If you select formatting options before creating a text box, those selections will apply to the newly created box. To change all text formatting of an existing text box at the same time, you can select the box and change your formatting options. To only change a certain word or character, double-click the text box and adjust formatting as needed. For more information about working with text boxes in your document, see Typing, Importing, and Changing Text.
Formatting Words and Characters
Character formatting can apply to a word or a single character in your text. The Format tab of the Text Style panel contains the LayOut character formatting options. You can find the Text Style panel in the Default Tray, or access it from Window > Default Tray > Text Style.
The Format tab contains the following character-formatting options:
Family – Lists all supported fonts available to LayOut. Selecting an option sets that font for your selected text.
Typeface – If your font has bold and italic styles, they will appear in the Typeface column.
Size – You can select a font size, or type a size and press Enter. To adjust the text size less precisely, scroll through the options, or choose Text > Bigger or Text > Smaller.
- Underline (
) and Strikethrough (
) – At the top of the window, options for Underline and Strikethrough appear in the toolbar. - Text color – In the Fonts toolbar, click the color swatch (
) to the right of Font Typeface (
) to open the Colors panel. Select a color in the panel, using the color wheel, sliders, image, or preset settings. For more information, see Choosing Colors. Superscript and Subscript – To make a selected number, character, or symbol a superscript of subscript, select Text > Baseline > Superscript or Text > Baseline > Subscript.
Formatting Paragraphs
Paragraph formatting applies to paragraphs of text. For example, you can center a paragraph but not a single word in a paragraph. Paragraph formatting options are located on the Text Style panel and the Text menu.
Following are LayOut’s paragraph formatting options:
- Alignment – Within a text box, you can horizontally align paragraphs to the left (
), right (
), or center (
). Each alignment option is located in the Fonts toolbar. Or, select Text > Align and choose Left, Right, or Center. - Anchoring – Text is anchored to the top, center, or bottom of a text box. To change the vertical text anchor, select the text and click Anchor Top (
), Anchor Center (
), or Anchor Bottom (
) in the Fonts toolbar. Or, select Text > Anchor and choose Top, Center, or Bottom. Lists – You can format selected paragraphs as bulleted or ordered lists in the List tab. Ordered lists include numeric and alphabetical lists.
For ordered lists, you can specify the separator and start position for the list. For example, entering 1 as the start value for a lower-case alphabetical list makes the list start with the letter “a” whereas entering 2 makes it start with the letter “b.”
Managing Fonts
LayOut supports OpenType fonts with TrueType and PostScript outlines. These fonts have a .ttf or .otf file extension. If you install a supported font on your computer, the font appears among the font family options in the Text Style panel.
LayOut doesn’t embed fonts in its files. That means a font you use may not appear as intended if you share your file with someone who doesn’t have access to that font. If a font is missing, LayOut will automatically substitute it with a default font.