page breaks directly after a section title

Question

I am struggling trying to put together some technical documents (using the article class). Is there a way to allow page breaks directly after a section title? If possible, I would like to let some of the subsection levels to break directly after the subsection header.

At several points in the document, I have to create lists using the section numbering and need the text next to the number. Until now, I have had an empty title and the text forced indented with adjustwidth following, but I need to be able to have the text on the same line as the number. I also would like to not have to force page breaks to prevent run off of the page when I am in one of these numbered lists. When I have tried using something like:

  \paragraph{beginning of the text} continuation of text

or defining these levels with runin, I cannot get the entire thing indented: only the first line (which I also have to have).

Here is my section title formatting and example: (I apologize if it is messy or poorly written)

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage{titlesec} 

\setcounter{secnumdepth}{5}%sets depth of numbering system
\setcounter{tocdepth}{1}

\titleformat{\subsection}[hang]{\normalfont\large\bfseries}{\thesubsection}{1em}{}
\titlespacing*{\subsection} {1em}{3.25ex plus 1ex minus .2ex}{1.5ex plus .2ex}


\titleformat{\subsubsection}[hang]{\normalfont\normalsize}{\thesubsubsection}{1em}{}
\titlespacing*{\subsubsection} {2em}{3.25ex plus 1ex minus .2ex}{1.5ex plus .2ex}

\titleformat{\paragraph}[hang]{\normalfont\normalsize}{\theparagraph}{1em}{}
\titlespacing*{\paragraph} {3em}{3.25ex plus 1ex minus .2ex}{1.5ex plus .2ex}



\titleformat{\subparagraph}[hang]{\normalfont\normalsize}{\thesubparagraph.}{1em}{}
\titlespacing*{\subparagraph} {4em}{3.25ex plus 1ex minus .2ex}{1.5ex plus .2ex}

\begin{document}

\section{title}
\subsection{title 2}
\subsubsection{title 3}
\paragraph{list item 1}
\paragraph{list item 2}
\paragraph{list item 3} 

\end{document}

EDIT: To clarify from some comments: I need the list structure to be indented and have the numbering with it (ex. 1.1.1.1 not just 1 as I would get with enumeration)

I also need the whole thing (sometimes a sentence or list item, sometimes paragraphs(hear meaning blocks of text, not the section title) as they have to be numbered) to be indented to the same point, preferably similar to a hang but not necessarily.

I can currently make it work with some specifically placed breaks, but as the document is edited, these are constantly having to be moved. I would like to let the document break around the headings without necessarily needing text underneath the heading.

I hope this helps to what I am hoping to achieve. Thanks!

Answer 1

It isn't totally clear what layout you need but it sounds like you want to use a list not section heads. If the layout here isn't quite as you need, the enumitem package makes it easy to customise the layout.

\documentclass{article}

\renewcommand\theenumii{\theenumi.\arabic{enumii}}
\renewcommand\theenumiii{\theenumii.\arabic{enumiii}}
\renewcommand\theenumiv{\theenumiii.\arabic{enumiv}}

\renewcommand\labelenumii{\theenumii.}
\begin{document}


\begin{enumerate}
\item\mbox{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item\mbox{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item zzzz
\item zzz
\end{enumerate}
\item\mbox{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item zzzz
\item zzz
\end{enumerate}
\end{enumerate}
\item zzzz
\item zzzz
\item\mbox{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item zzzz
\item\mbox{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item zzzz
\item zzz
\end{enumerate}
\end{enumerate}
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}