ListFormat class

Allows to control what list formatting is applied to a paragraph. To learn more, visit the Working with Lists documentation article.

Remarks

A paragraph in a Microsoft Word document can be bulleted or numbered. When a paragraph is bulleted or numbered, it is said that list formatting is applied to the paragraph.

You do not create objects of the ListFormat class directly. You access ListFormat as a property of another object that can have list formatting associated with it. At the moment the objects that can have list formatting are: Paragraph, Style and DocumentBuilder.

ListFormat of a Paragraph specifies what list formatting and list level is applied to that particular paragraph.

ListFormat of a Style (applicable to paragraph styles only) allows to specify what list formatting and list level is applied to all paragraphs of that particular style.

ListFormat of a DocumentBuilder provides access to the list formatting at the current cursor position inside the DocumentBuilder.

The list formatting itself is stored inside a List object that is stored separately from the paragraphs. The list objects are stored inside a ListCollection collection. There is a single ListCollection collection per Document.

The paragraphs do not physically belong to a list. The paragraphs just reference a particular list object via the ListFormat.list property and a particular level in the list via the ListFormat.list_level_number property. By setting these two properties you control what bullets and numbering is applied to a paragraph.

Properties

Name	Description
is_list_item	True when the paragraph has bulleted or numbered formatting applied to it.
list	Gets or sets the list this paragraph is a member of.
list_level	Returns the list level formatting plus any formatting overrides applied to the current paragraph.
list_level_number	Gets or sets the list level number (0 to 8) for the paragraph.

Methods

Name	Description
apply_bullet_default()	Starts a new default bulleted list and applies it to the paragraph.
apply_number_default()	Starts a new default numbered list and applies it to the paragraph.
list_indent()	Increases the list level of the current paragraph by one level.
list_outdent()	Decreases the list level of the current paragraph by one level.
remove_numbers()	Removes numbers or bullets from the current paragraph and sets list level to zero.

Examples

Shows how to work with list levels.

doc = aw.Document()
builder = aw.DocumentBuilder(doc)

self.assertFalse(builder.list_format.is_list_item)

# A list allows us to organize and decorate sets of paragraphs with prefix symbols and indents.
# We can create nested lists by increasing the indent level.
# We can begin and end a list by using a document builder's "list_format" property.
# Each paragraph that we add between a list's start and the end will become an item in the list.
# Below are two types of lists that we can create using a document builder.
# 1 -  A numbered list:
# Numbered lists create a logical order for their paragraphs by numbering each item.
builder.list_format.list = doc.lists.add(aw.lists.ListTemplate.NUMBER_DEFAULT)

self.assertTrue(builder.list_format.is_list_item)

# By setting the "list_level_number" property, we can increase the list level
# to begin a self-contained sub-list at the current list item.
# The Microsoft Word list template called "NumberDefault" uses numbers to create list levels for the first list level.
# Deeper list levels use letters and lowercase Roman numerals.
for i in range(9):

    builder.list_format.list_level_number = i
    builder.writeln(f"Level {i}")

# 2 -  A bulleted list:
# This list will apply an indent and a bullet symbol ("•") before each paragraph.
# Deeper levels of this list will use different symbols, such as "■" and "○".
builder.list_format.list = doc.lists.add(aw.lists.ListTemplate.BULLET_DEFAULT)

for i in range(9):
    builder.list_format.list_level_number = i
    builder.writeln(f"Level {i}")

# We can disable list formatting to not format any subsequent paragraphs as lists by un-setting the "List" flag.
builder.list_format.list = None

self.assertFalse(builder.list_format.is_list_item)

doc.save(ARTIFACTS_DIR + "Lists.specify_list_level.docx")

ListFormat class