Indent full paragraph

[Aurora]

hi there,

I have a small problem with Latex.
I want to indent a full paragraph, not only the first line. The only solution I found is to use \begin{quote}. I don't like this at all because I don't want an indention at the right site.
Maybe I can create a quote-like environment with left-only indent!?

Thanks for you help!

[gmedina]

Maybe I can create a quote-like environment with left-only indent!?

Sure you can. Try something like the following

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

\newenvironment{myindentpar}[1]%
 {\begin{list}{}%
         {\setlength{\leftmargin}{#1}}%
         \item[]%
 }
 {\end{list}}

And use it like this:

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

\begin{myindentpar}{3cm}
text text text...
\end{myindentpar}

[Aurora]

Thank you very much. Works great.

But I have some questions for understanding.

• Are the percent-symbols (%) important for functionality?
  
• in this line: \newenvironment{myindentpar}[1]%. [1] is a variable for the first parameter!?
  

Thanks so far.

[gmedina]

Are the percent-symbols (%) important for functionality?

Not really (in this case).

in this line: \newenvironment{myindentpar}[1]%. [1] is a variable for the first parameter!?

[1] indicates that the myindentpar environment has one argument (in this case, the length you want to use to indent your paragraph).

[nieproszenieja]

There is a better way to do this - command ' \hangindent=length ' (e.g. \hangindent=1cm, etc.) inside paragraph do the trick.

[gmedina]

There is a better way to do this - command ' \hangindent=length ' (e.g. \hangindent=1cm, etc.) inside paragraph do the trick.

Please, explain what you mean with better:

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\newenvironment{myindentpar}[1]%
{\begin{list}{}%
         {\setlength{\leftmargin}{#1}}%
         \item[]%
}
{\end{list}}

\begin{document}

\lipsum[1]

\begin{myindentpar}{1cm}
  \lipsum[1]
\end{myindentpar}

\hangindent=1cm
\lipsum[1]

\end{document}

[localghost]

There is a better way to do this - command ' \hangindent=length ' (e.g. \hangindent=1cm, etc.) inside paragraph do the trick.

In this case the \hangindent command should be combined with the \hangafter command, which sets the number of lines typeset without indentation. The default setting is one line.

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage[bindingoffset=1cm,centering,includeheadfoot,margin=2cm]{geometry}
\usepackage{blindtext}
\usepackage{txfonts}

\parindent0em

\begin{document}
  \hangindent2em
  \hangafter=0
  \blindtext

  \medskip
  \blindtext
\end{document}

The first paragraph is now indented entirely by the given value. Both commands are TeX primitives.


Best regards
Thorsten¹

[nieproszenieja]

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\begin{document}
%(some code....)
\hangindent=1cm
\lipsum[1]

\end{document}

Replace 1cm with \parindent (\hangindent=\parindent), the result will be quite the same as yours.
You can also put 'setlength{\parindent}{1cm}' before '\hangindent=1cm', then the result will be the same.

EDIT: tex command \hangafter has also one usefull option (from tex refrence card):
\hangafter = (number) start hanging indent after line n.
If n < 0, indent first |n| lines.

[orey]

I had the problem in a resume where I did not want to have the spaces generated by the list solution.
The solution I found was to create an invisible table with no internal space in cells.

Code: Select all  •  Open in writeLaTeX

%===============Variables
\def \constzeroindent {0cm}
\def \constfirstindent {0.5cm}
\def \constsecondindent {1cm}

%===============Macros
\newenvironment{mycustomindent}[1]
{\setlength{\parindent}{#1}}
{\setlength{\parindent}{\constzeroindent}}

\newcommand{\myindentedpar}[1]{
\begin{mycustomindent}{\constsecondindent}
\begin{tabular}{@{}p{17cm}@{}}
#1 \\
\end{tabular}
\end{mycustomindent}}

%===============Use
\myindentedpar{Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.}

Advantage is that it is justified.