Footnotes and Endnotes in Open Office.

Now, I don’t write about software and hardware because there are bloggers and regular people who know way more about this stuff than I do. But, in formatting my dissertation and my new netbook/mini Dell box, I’ve come across some issues for which there are many possible solutions on the internet. Some are dated. Some conflict. Some are round-about. Some are on public forums where: person A has a problem; person B offers a solution which does not quite work; person C offers a solution; but person A never writes back to say if it worked or not. So you’ll have to excuse my temporary overstepping of my usual boundaries in this exercise in open source Pragmatikism.*

Okay. You have, literally, hundreds of endnotes that you need to make into footnotes in Open Office. You have committed to writing your entire dissertation (or essay or novel or whatever) in open source software, down to the fonts. Maybe you already entered your notations as footnotes that just appear at the end of the document, rather than the end of the page. In the current version of Open Office Writer, go to Tools–>Footnotes/Endnotes. Under “Position,” click either “End of page” or “End of Document” under the “Footnotes” tab. If nothing happens, you have endnotes. If they move, they are footnotes.  Put them where you want them.

Mine did not move. So. Most guides tell you that you’re either screwed, that you have to resort to Windoze MS Orifice, or that you have to do them one by one. Well, you do have to do them one by one, but at the rate of about one second (or less) each. Do this:

1) Find the first endnote anchor (the little number or symbol). Right-click it, and click “Footnote/Endnote,” third from the bottom.
2) When the little box appears, click the dot from “Endnote” to “Footnote.” Instead of doing them all like this, however, DO NOT hit “OK.” Rather, hit the arrow to the right. This will take you to the next endnote. Click the dot again, arrow again, and you can get through a few hundred of these in a very very short time.
3) Need to move them again? Now that they are footnotes, you can make them appear at the end of the page or at the end of the document (like endnotes) via Tools–>Footnotes/Endnotes.
4) The lesson here: NEVER USE ENDNOTES IN OPEN OFFICE!
5) Hint I’ve found for editing them all: Make them appear at the end of the document. Then you can edit them more easily and then revert to having them at the bottom of the page with the touch of a button. Easy-peasy!

*(As opposed to the much better Pragmatism of American philosophy.)