Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 12:58 pm Post subject: LOST "FILL DOWN" AFTER JAVA FOR MAC OS X 10.6 UPDA
I installed Java for Mac OS X 10.6 Update 2 (Java SE 6 1.6.0_20) on my MacBook Pro yesterday. The "FD" toolbar button in Calc is dimmed, and I can no longer "Fill Down." Can anyone suggest a fix? Thank you.
What version and patch of NeoOffice are you using? You can find the version and patch by selecting the Help :: About NeoOffice menu.
Also, when you select a range of cells and wait a second, does the Fill Down toolbar button become enabled? If not, can you select the Edit :: Fill menu and tell us if those are disabled as well?
I'm using NeoOffice 3.1.1 Patch 0. I tried everything, including waiting after highlighting what I wanted to fill before clicking "FD" and going Tools > Detective > Fill Mode. Going through Tools > Detective > Fill Mode would light up the "FD" icon in the toolbar. However, I could only fill once. I had to repeat the T > D > FM process each time I wanted to fill. Also, the T > D > process caused the 'pouring paint bucket' icon to show on my screen, which never occurred before. This was very different from what I was able to do before the Java update. Before the update, I could highlight what I wanted to fill, cllck "FD" and the fill down would occur without problem.
I'm using NeoOffice 3.1.1 Patch 0. I tried everything, including waiting after highlighting what I wanted to fill before clicking "FD" and going Tools > Detective > Fill Mode. Going through Tools > Detective > Fill Mode would light up the "FD" icon in the toolbar. However, I could only fill once. I had to repeat the T > D > FM process each time I wanted to fill. Also, the T > D > process caused the 'pouring paint bucket' icon to show on my screen, which never occurred before. This was very different from what I was able to do before the Java update. Before the update, I could highlight what I wanted to fill, cllck "FD" and the fill down would occur without problem.
I always get the paint can cursor like you see even on Mac OS X 10.4.11 so it is definitely not the Java update (NeoOffice uses C++ code, not Java for most of its code). Instead, I suspect that this is an idiosyncracy in how NeoOffice's underlying OpenOffice.org controls the Fill Mode menu.
The problem that I have is that the Fill Down toolbar never appears so I cannot even get to the point where the Fill Down toolbar is disabled.
So at this point I can only give you a workaround: instead of using the toolbar button and menus, click on a source cell that you want to use to fill. Then press the Command key and while holding that key, drag the small square at the bottom right corner of the cell so that a red border surrounds the cells that you want to fill and then release the mouse.
BTW, I found one more workaround: select the cells to fill and then select one of Edit :: Fill submens. Does that workaround also work?
One thing that may be part of the problem with the Fill Down toolbar button is that the Tools :: Detective :: Fill Mode menu actually has no relation to the Fill Down action. I did some research and selecting the Fill Mode menu actually is supposed to display the paint can cursor. Then, when you click on a cell that contains a formula, the cells that the formula references will be marked with a blue border and a line from those cells to the clicked cell will be drawn.
In other words, the Tools :: Detective :: Fill Mode menu allows you to visually show the flow of cell computations within a selected set of cells.
THANK YOU. Both workarounds worked. I like your first suggestion better because it's quicker.
Quite a few versions ago, I was able to highlight down and then click Cmd-D to fill down. That shortcut disappeared in one of the NeoOffice updates. Maybe I can figure out how to do a macro so that I can fill down with a shortcut of my creation. Meanwhile, I'll use your fixes.
Thank you again for your kind and quick help!
Dick
P.S. I misspoke about an "FD" key in the toolbar. Some time ago, after I could no longer fill down with the Cmd-D shortcut, I used the "Customize" toolbar function to place the "Down" function in one of my toolbars. After highlighting downward what I wanted to fill, clicking "Down" in the toolbar filled down. I modified "Down" to "FD," to shorten the space the command took in my toolbar. Thereafter, I forgot that I had changed "Down" to "FD." It's the "Down" command that no longer worked after yesterday's Mac Java update, to fill down when I clicked "FD" in my toolbar. I still think the Mac Java update had something to do with the loss of function of my "FD" button. It worked before the update, but not after. No big deal now that you've given me workarounds. THANKS AGAIN.
FYI. You can add a key shortcut for Fill Down in NeoOffice using the following steps:
1. Open a new or existing Calc document
2. Select the Tools :: Customize menu and in the dialog that appears, click on the Keyboard tab
3. Make sure the Calc radio button in the top right corner is selected and then select "Edit" in the "Category" list and "Fill Down" in the "Function" list.
4. Select an unused key shortcut in the "Shortcut keys" list (I used Command-Shift-D because Command-D was already assigned to something else), press the Modify button, and press the OK button.
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