First indent is shorter than it should be

Question

I am using \paragraph{} at the beginning of chapter. All my paragraphs are intended automatically but first indent is always little bit shorter than others (I mean that white space). Does anyone experienced this problem before? I have no idea what's wrong

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt,oneside,onecolumn,final,openany]{report}
\usepackage[utf8x]{inputenc}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[slovak]{babel}
\usepackage{ae}
\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\usepackage{graphicx}
\usepackage{makeidx}
\usepackage[top=2.5cm, bottom=2.5cm, left=3cm, right=2.5cm, includefoot]{geometry} %total={17cm,25cm},
\usepackage{longtable}
\usepackage{amsthm}
\usepackage{amssymb}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{textcomp}
\pagestyle{fancy}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\usepackage{float}
\usepackage{subfig}
\usepackage{booktabs, multicol, multirow}
\usepackage{bigstrut}

\begin{document}

\def\baselinestretch{1.2}\normalsize

\chapter*{First one}

\paragraph{}
\bigskip

{\bf First} - aaaaaa\\

{\bf Second} - bbbbbb\\

{\bf Third} - ccccccc\\

\end{document}

Please add a minimal working example (MWE) that illustrates your problem. It will be much easier for us to reproduce your situation and find out what the issue is when we see compilable code, starting with \documentclass{...} and ending with \end{document}. — Marco Daniel, May 05 '13 at 11:50
Here it is. I let there all the packages I am using in case they cause the problem. — user2306381, May 05 '13 at 12:01
Unrelated note: You shouldn't use \bf, see Does it matter if I use \textit or \it, \bfseries or \bf, etc.. It looks like you're creating a list, and there are list environments for that, see e.g. http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX/List_Structures. — Torbjørn T., May 05 '13 at 12:23
don't use a double backslash to end a paragraph. some good reasons are given in the answers to the question Why gap + indent after \ and return. — barbara beeton, May 05 '13 at 12:38

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered May 05 '13 at 12:05

\paragraph is a sectioning command, just as \chapter, \section etc, it is not intended for starting a new paragraph -- an empty line does that (or \par).

In the standard classes, there is no indentation of the first paragraph of a chapter/section (why should there be?), but the \paragraph command adds some space. Hence, what you're seeing is not paragraph indentation, but space added by the \paragraph command.

If you really want to indent the first paragraph, use indentfirst as mentioned by Mario, and remove the \paragraph{}.

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
\section{First section}
First paragraph. Not indented.

Second paragraph, indented.

\paragraph{Lower level heading}     \texttt{paragraph} is below \texttt{subsection} (and \texttt{subsubsection}).

\section{Second section}

\paragraph{} \texttt{paragraph} used wrongly, note extra space.
\end{document}

Thanks a lot, it works. Seems I didn't understand how paragraph works. — user2306381, May 05 '13 at 12:10
@user2306381 Glad it helped. Please accept my answer, by clicking the check mark to the left. This marks the question as answered, and awards some reputation points to both myself and you. See our welcome page for more information about how the site works. — Torbjørn T., May 05 '13 at 12:21

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered May 05 '13 at 11:55

1

I think you can use the indentfirst package by David Carlisle (available here) and then call it on your preamble:

\documentclass{report}

\usepackage{indentfirst}

\begin{document}
\chapter{First Chapter}
Hello.

This is my second paragraph.

\end{document}

answered May 05 '13 at 11:55

Mario S. E.

18,609

I tried that already, it didn't make any change. – user2306381 May 05 '13 at 12:02
Did you take away all the \paragrahp{} ? It should work... – Mario S. E. May 05 '13 at 12:19

First indent is shorter than it should be

2 Answers2