Currently the Format.Section dialog lists the sections in order of their
insertion time.

MRU->OS: would it generate high effort to implement a possibility to list the
sectoins in order of their position?

The navigator shows the right order.

For the API there is no need for a order because the sections can be nested but
they appears only as a section of the document (not as a section of a section)
at the same level in the elements list.

>The navigator shows the right order

Yes, that is true, I think the navigator enumerates the content (via createEnumeration() ) while 
Format.Sections uses the XTextSectionsSupplier....

> For the API there is no need for a order because the sections can be nested but
> they appears only as a section of the document (not as a section of a section)
> at the same level in the elements list.

the getChildSections() API of XTextSection returns a sequence of first level child sections in the wrong 
sequence (i.e. sequence in which they were added, and not the sequence they are in within the 
docment) . 

By the fact, that *all* child sections are been returned, there can't be a wrong
order.

Use this code:


REM  *****  BASIC  *****
Option Explicit

Sub Main
	SectionTest
End Sub

Sub SectionTest
	Dim Sections As Object
	Dim Elements() As String
	Dim OutStr As String
	Dim i As Integer
	Dim j As Integer
	Sections = ThisComponent.getTextSections()
	Elements = Sections.ElementNames
	OutStr = ""
	For i = LBound( Elements() ) To UBound( Elements() )
		OutStr = OutStr & Chr( 13 ) & Elements( i )
		recursiveChilds( Sections.getByIndex( i ), 1, OutStr )
	Next i
	Msgbox OutStr
End Sub

Sub recursiveChilds( Section As Object, iLevel As Integer, s As String )
	Dim i As Integer
	Dim Childs() As Object
	Childs() = Section.getChildSections()
	For i = LBound( Childs() ) To UBound( Childs() )
		s = s & Chr( 13 ) & String( 4 * iLevel, " " ) & "|-" & Childs( i ).getName()
		recursiveChilds( Childs( i ), iLevel + 1, s )
	Next i
End Sub

I am afraid you have misunderstood the problem. 
The issue is not whether you can iterate all sections (you can, as you have described). The issue is that the 
order of the sections returned by getTextSections() or getChildSections() does not reflect the order of 
sections as they appear in the document.
Refer to the use case to duplicate the problem ast the start of the issue report.

I understand the problem, but you don't see the point (please use my code to test):

ThisComponent.getTextSections() returs *all*(!) sections that are located in the
document! Even all child sections. So how should be there any order?

Also Section.getChildSections() returns *all*(!) child sections, not only the
direct childs!

Otherwise you must claim for that this methods returns *only* the first level
sections and child sections respectively. But i think, this isn't a good idea ...

Hope you see it clear now.

>ThisComponent.getTextSections() returs *all*(!) sections that are located in the
>document! Even all child sections. So how should be there any order?

If you have a nested section hierarchy like this in your document :
root1
	sec1.1
		sec1.1.1
	sec1.2
root2
	sec2.1
		sec2.1.1
	sec2.2	

it seems logical to me that the order would be the collapsed tree :

root1
sec1.1
sec1.1.1
sec1.2
root2
sec2.1
sec2.1.1
sec2.2	

>Also Section.getChildSections() returns *all*(!) child sections, not only the
>direct childs!

Hmm....this is'nt so, at least in OOo2.3.0 ... I always get only the immediate children (not grand 
children, or great-grand-children....)

I was trying to build something like the navigator view for my application, for which getTextSections
().getByName() with getChildSections() is unusable because the order is the order of section creation....

Created attachment 49199 [details]
Listing of nested sections

I can't believe that your OOo 2.3 produce a other output then my OOo 2.3.

So please compare the output of your OOo with the output of my OOo stored in the
frame of the sample file that i attached.

>Also Section.getChildSections() returns *all*(!) child sections, not only the
>direct childs!

Yes... I am getting the same output from your doument attachment.  
But clearly Section.getChildSections() is not returning *all* descendant sections (it returns only the 
immediate children).. otherwise you wouldnt be making a recursive call to getChildSections() would you?
 
When i look at in the watch window getChildSections() clearly returns only the first level children.

Honestly, i dont quite the thread of your argument, what does it have to do with the issue ?

Sorry, it was my mikstake. :-(

With

If IsNull( oSection.getParentSection() ) Then
  sString = sString & Chr( 13 ) & oSection.getName()
  ooomr_recursiveChilds( oSection, 1, sString )
End If

you also get the right result at top level.

So yes, my arguments don't affect to this issue furthermore.

But please have a look at the following:
If there are frames in the document and the frames contains sections - where
they are located? Frames could be bound to a paragraph or a page. Where should
they appear in your order?

If there are sections in a document and there is also a frame with sections in
it, in this manner, that the view of the sections overlap one another, the
navigator shows the order of the view order, not the straight nested section
order. (Look at the picture that i attach. The sections beginning with "(f?)"
are located in the frame.)

I don't know, how the API could reflect this behavior without scanning the view
of the document. If you want to get this order and if you could ask the
navigator about the sections, perhaps your problem could be solved. But i dont
know if that is possible.

Created attachment 49251 [details]
section order view in navigator, sections in a frame

I worked this around by using enumeration to get accurate section order, something like the following :

Dim sect
sect=thisComponent.getTextSections().getByName("root")
Dim sectRange
sectRange = sect.getAnchor()
Dim sectText 
sectText = sectRange.getText()
dim prevSection
prevSection = "root"
Dim sectEnum
Dim orderStr 
orderStr = ""
sectEnum = sectText.createEnumeration()
while (sectEnum.hasMoreElements() )
	dim nextElem
	nextElem = sectEnum.nextElement()
 	if (Not isnull(nextElem.TextSection)) then
 	   if (not IsEmpty(nextElem.TextSection)) then 
 	    dim tSect
 	    tSect = nextElem.TextSection.Name
 	    orderStr = orderStr + tSect + chr(13)+chr(10)
 		end if
 	
 	end if
wend

msgbox orderStr

this would work even for frames since enumeration relies on visible structure of the document. Its more 
tedious, and definitely slower but it works. You would just need to check for TextFrame objects in the 
main enumeration loop, and enumerate for sections within those.

Reset assigne to the default "issues@openoffice.apache.org".