[reportlab-users] cannot split paragraph at first line

Matthias Miller Blog at OutOfHanwell.com
Thu Mar 20 18:34:31 EDT 2008


Robin Becker wrote:

> Matthias Miller wrote:

>> I'm trying to split a paragraph at the first line, and

>> Paragraph.split is not returning any results. Is this by design? Is

>> there another way I should split the paragraph at the first line?

>>

>> I've attached a patch that includes a unit test illustrating the

>> behavior, as well as a proposed fix.

>>

>> -Matthias Miller

> .........

> The avoidance of unpleasant splits is why we don't want to allow

> splitting between first and second lines. It is called an 'orphan' the

> other way round splitting after the penultimate line is called a

> 'widow'. Orphans have a future and no past while widows have a past

> and no future. According to my style guides oprhans are bad. In the

> past widows were also frowned on, but it seems that has gone out of

> fashion and they are allowed.

That makes good sense. My document layout is still in flux, so perhaps I
can do without it. If not, is there any chance of acceptance with a
config option to enable orphaning?


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