Why does writer create automatic styles for every new element?

users
#1

Hi!

When I create a new Writer document, each element I enter in the document (like a heading or paragraph) adds new elements to <office:automatic-styles> in "content.xml", even though I do not use any direct formatting. So, selecting style "Title", entering the title, then selecting "Text Body" and entering a paragraph creates the following automatic styles in "content.xml":

<office:automatic-styles>
<style:style style:name="P1" style:family="paragraph" style:parent-style-name="Text_20_body">
<style:text-properties officeooo:paragraph-rsid="00063317"/>
</style:style>
<style:style style:name="P2" style:family="paragraph" style:parent-style-name="Title">
<style:text-properties officeooo:paragraph-rsid="00063317"/>
</style:style>
<style:style style:name="T1" style:family="text">
<style:text-properties officeooo:rsid="00063317"/>
</style:style>
</office:automatic-styles>

and the actual content:

<office:body>
<office:text>
<text:p text:style-name="P2"><text:span text:style-name="T1">This is my title</text:span></text:p>
<text:p text:style-name="P1"><text:span text:style-name="T1">This is a text body paragraph.</text:span></text:p>
</office:text>
</office:body>

Now, I can delete the unwanted direct formatting by clicking "Format - Clear direct formatting". Then, the content looks as nice and clean:

<text:p text:style-name="Title">This is my title</text:p>
<text:p text:style-name="Text_20_body">This is a text body paragraph.</text:p>

However, this removal of unnecessary direct formatting is not very appropriate, as I sometimes do have direct formatting (a subscript for instance).
Is it possible to suppress Writer's behaviour of defining those meaningless automatic styles? And if not, is it possible to get rid of only the meaningless direct formatting, i.e. those <style:style> elements, that do not contain any formatting attributes?

I'm using LibreOffice Version 4.0.3.3.

Thanks for your help,
Holger

#2

However, this removal of unnecessary direct formatting is not very
appropriate, as I sometimes do have direct formatting (a subscript for
instance).

You can create subscript by applying character style to specific set of
characters. Removing direct formatting will not remove character style.

But then, using styles for each and every change of formatting is sometimes
tiresome (especially when style is applied to only one paragraph/character).

Is it possible to suppress Writer's behaviour of defining those
meaningless automatic styles? And if not, is it possible to get rid of
only the meaningless direct formatting, i.e. those <style:style>
elements, that do not contain any formatting attributes?

Not that I am aware of.

As for "why" (in topic title): this is rather advanced question and requires
more knowledge about LO internals than most users here have. Perhaps you would
have better luck asking this question on developers mailing list - they have
better insight than us and might provide some useful information.

But I *suppose* that this is one of many artifacts back from OOo 1.0 or even
StarOffice times. And since it is critical for entire software, no one has dared
to touch it yet.