iWork '09: The Missing Manual

Creating Styles by Example

Whether you’re modifying an existing style or building a new one from scratch, Pages lets you “create by example”—in other words, you format the text in the document the way you want it to look and then tell Pages to memorize that formatting as a new style.

Modifying Existing Paragraph and List Styles

Paragraph and list styles both apply their formatting to entire paragraphs, and modifying either type of style involves the same process. The following steps use a paragraph style for the example, but you can use the same process to change a list style, too. To begin modifying a style, choose a paragraph in your document you’d like to see formatted with your new style, or just type a new paragraph so you have some text to work with.

1. Place your insertion point in the paragraph and choose View → Show Styles Drawer, or click the Styles Drawer button in the Format Bar.

   Pages presents the document’s styles collection.

2. Click the style that’s closest to the one you want to create, and Pages formats the selected paragraph in your chosen style.

3. Make all your modifications to the paragraph, tweaking the font, size, color, indentation, spacing, tabs, you name it.

   You can use any of the character and paragraph formatting options described in Chapter 2 (pages 59–81). Mold the paragraph to your whim.

4. Click the arrow to the right of the current paragraph style in the Styles Drawer. The arrow is red, indicating you’ve applied style overrides.

   The pop-up menu offers two ways to handle ...