Without reservations

[Edited entry from 1/16/2005]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

CAPS - No - caps

You can make changes to selected text by going to
Format>Change Case
and choosing the correct style. (Including tOGGLE cASE)

You could also use a keyboard shortcut.
Select the text and then hold down the SHIFT key and tap the F3 key to toggle through three of the main cases – All Cap, Lowercase, and Title.

SAP Design Guild:
Quick Guide to Capitalization in English

Technical Communicators' Forum:
Capitalization of Headings and Titles

From The Editorium.com:
Here's a macro to change Heading styles to true Title case:
TITLE CASE MACRO, VERSION 2
By Jack M. Lyon

Word Tips:
Capital after colon

Automatically correct capitalization in most any MS 2007 App.

[Edited entry from 1/22/2005]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

Clean up tools

"When you save Web pages format with Microsoft Word, additional tags are added so that you can continue to use the full functionality of Word to edit your content.

To reduce the size of Web pages, you can save them in filtered HTML. Filtered format removes Microsoft Office-specific tags. If you save in filtered HTML and then reopen the file in Office programs, text and general appearance will be preserved, but some features may work differently.

If you reopen a Web page in Word that you saved in filtered HTML, your text and general appearance are preserved, but you may not be able to use certain Word features in the usual way to edit your files. For example, the appearance of bulleted or numbered lists is preserved; however, some of the Word functionality associated with lists will not be preserved.

If you will need to edit the file later, you can maintain two files: one in Word format and one in filtered HTML format. You can edit the content in the Word document, save it in Word format for future editing, and then save a copy in filtered HTML format."

Labels: Word

A suggestion I don't suggest

1. On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click the Edit tab.
   
2. Under Editing options, select the Keep track of formatting check box, if it is not already selected.
   
3. Under Editing options, select the Mark formatting inconsistencies check box.
   Formatting inconsistencies will be marked with blue, wavy underlines.
   
4. Click OK.
   
5. In your document, right-click the blue, wavy underline where a formatting inconsistency has occurred.
   
6. Do one of the following:
   To correct the inconsistency, click the command that describes the inconsistency.
   To have Word remove the blue, wavy underline and not correct this inconsistency, click Ignore Once.
   To skip all occurrences of the inconsistency in the document, click Ignore Rule.

PC World:
Word 2002 adds fast formatting for stylin' documents.

ShaunaKelly.com:
How the Styles and Formatting pane works in Microsoft Word 2002 and 2003

I would suggest that you don't use this feature. See:
Runaway Styles in 2003

If you are going to use it, just to track formatting, remember to turn it off for the majority of uses.

Also see Wopr lounge

[Edited entry from 11/17/2004]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

Pre-defined locations

This macro, for instance, changes the text in just the header of the first section:

Sub HeaderFooterObject()
  Dim MyText As String
  MyHeaderText = "This would be your text"
  With ActiveDocument.Sections(1)
   .Headers(wdHeaderFooterPrimary).Range.Text = MyHeaderText
  End With
End Sub

When you use Edit>Replace in Word, it does a fine job of locating all occurrences of the target in the body of the document or in the header or footer.

Something fails, however, when you record the action and try to run it as a macro. To make it work, you must loop through the built in ranges of a Word document.

The exercise is interesting if only for the exposure to the built in ranges such as:

• wdCommentsStory
  
• wdEndnotesStory
  
• wdEvenPagesFooterStory
  
• wdEvenPagesHeaderStory
  
• wdFirstPageFooterStory
  
• wdFirstPageHeaderStory
  
• wdFootnotesStory
  
• wdMainTextStory
  
• wdPrimaryFooterStory
  
• wdPrimaryHeaderStory
  
  and
  
• wdTextFrameStory.

See this article for more information:

Word.MVPS.org:
Find and replace with VBA

Also:

Microsoft KB
VBA macro examples to insert text into a document

[Edited entry from 12/3/2004]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

Or do you love it?

" This study sought to determine if certain personalities and uses are associated with various fonts. Using an online survey, participants rated the personality of 20 fonts using 15 adjective pairs. In addition, participants viewed the same 20 fonts and selected which uses were most appropriate.

Results suggested that personality traits are indeed attributed to fonts based on their design family (Serif, Sans-Serif, Modern, Monospace, Script/Funny) and are associated with appropriate uses.

Implications of these results to the design of online materials and websites are discussed."

Labels: Word

Choose your own location

Word

you can change the default location by going to Tools>Options. On the "File Locations" tab you can modify the storage location.

Excel

Tools>Options. On the "General" tab change the default location.

PowerPoint

uses Tools>Options and the "Save" tab.

Access

Tools>Options and the "General" tab for Databases and Projects

Publisher

Tools>Options "General".

Outlook

will make you take an underground tour into the Registry to change the location to save e-mail attachments.

FrontPage/Expression Web

appears to require the same sort of spelunking.

Labels: Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word

Twaddle free

"The Federal Government's writing must be in plain language. By using plain language, we send a clear message about what the Government is doing, what it requires, and what services it offers. Plain language saves the Government and the private sector time, effort, and money."

Plain language can be understood by YOUR reader at first reading. It doesn't mean writing for a certain grade level - it means organizing and writing for your reader. Writing in plain language saves time and money for writers and readers.

The Plain Language Center
Building Plain Language from the Ground Up

Introducing Plain Language

Plain language matches the needs of the reader with your needs as a writer, resulting in effective and efficient communication. It is effective because the reader can understand the message. It is efficient because the reader can read and understand the message the first time.

Also:
LegalWriting.net
Plain language produces clear, concise, and readable documents

And then for no reason ,other than most writing is twaddle, here's a review of:

How Mumbo-jumbo Conquered the World:
A Short History of Modern Delusions
by Francis Wheen.

It's entitled: "Twaddle unswaddled".
Appropriate or not, it is fun to say.

[Edited entry from 12/27/2004]




See all Topics

Labels: Addendum, Word

Demos

As part of their series of demos, Microsoft has information on creating mailing labels from a database, or mailing list.

Create labels with mail merge

Here is another entry concerning some of the fine points.

More label info

Also, if you place a graphic in the first cell, it will be duplicated in each box.



See all Topics

Labels: Word

Order!

1. Make a list of the important words.
   
2. Create a two-column table in a new document.
   
3. In the first column, enter the word or phrase.
   
4. In the second column, enter the index entry
   (If you need a sub-category, type the main entry followed by a colon (:) and then the sub category.)
   
5. Save the file.

When it comes time to create the Index, place the insertion point, go to Insert>Reference Index and Tables. Choose Index and then AutoMark.
(2007 – Reference Tab>Index group)

Browse to the location of your Index file.

Word will now automatically use your list to mark the main document and insert an Index.

Also:

Word for Word:
An Index or a Concordance for Your Book?

Word MVPS.org:
How can I automatically generate an index in Word?

Microsoft KB:
How to create a table of contents and index with field codes in Word

[Edited entry from 12/19/2004]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

Go back

"When you use Windows Explorer or the desktop to create a new 2007 Microsoft Office file, a new Office file is created in an XML file format (.dox or .xlsx). For example, this behavior occurs when you right-click the desktop, you point to New, and then you click Microsoft Office Word Document. By default, files that you create in the 2007 Office system are in XML file formats.

This article is about how to create legacy Office files, such as .doc files, .xls files, .ppt files, or .mdb files in the 2007 Office system. You can create legacy Office files without opening any Office applications. To do this, you must modify some settings. The modified settings will apply to all the users who log on to the computer."

Labels: Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Word

Problem solvers

1. Go to Edit>Replace
   
2. Make sure to include all of your local drives in the search and that "include subfolders" is checked.
   
3. Search for:
   *.tmp
   
4. Then delete all these temp files.
   

1. Use Edit>Find to locate Normal.DOT.
   
2. Rename it (Normal.OLD) or delete it. Word will create a new copy when it restarts.
   

The only caveat here is be careful that you don't have important macros stored in Normal.DOT. If you rename, you can recover them.

THIRD

If that does not correct the problem, try this next step:

1. Go to Start>Run and type:
   winword.exe /a
   (Note that there is a space before the /a)
   
2. Then press ENTER. This starts Word without any add-ins, global templates, or Normal.DOT.
   Look in Tools>Templates and Add-ins to see if there are any files that can be un-checked.
   

Labels: Word

An easier read

Use named arguments for cleaner VBA code.

Most likely, you use positional arguments when working with VBA functions. For instance, to create a message box, you probably use a statement that adheres to the following syntax:

 MsgBox(prompt[, buttons] [, title] [, helpfile, context])

MsgBox "Hello World!", , "My Message Box"

MsgBox Title:="My Message Box", _
       Prompt:="Hello World!"

Labels: Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Word

An Add-in, of course

"To use the add-in, open Word 2007, type Alt-= to create a RichEdit math object, type an equation or expression, and right-click on the equation to see options for solving and graphing within Word."

Labels: Word

Custom content

• The curly brackets { } cannot be entered from the key board. Either use Insert>Field, or Ctrl+F9.
  
• Word uses spaces in the If..Then..Else statement.
  
• The last two quote marks "" are "empty" , so nothing will be entered.
  
• Notice the \\ in the path statement. A path is not needed if the Main document is in the same folder as the letters.
  
• To see the field codes, use Alt+F9 to toggle the view on and off.

Letters 1 and 2 can have completely different texts, formats and layouts. One can be an invitation to a sale, the other can be a dunning letter.
(To carry over different formatting, leave out the \* MERGEFORMAT switch)

After setting up the main document for mail merging, insert all of the fields you want to merge.

Copy the individual fields and paste them in the correct locations in Letter 1 and 2.

Go back to the main document and erase all of the text and fields EXCEPT for the IF statements.

Letters 1 and 2 do not have to be set up a merge docs, or connected to a data source. Their text will be inserted in the Main document depending on the field type.

Labels: Word

Stop them up front

Labels: Word

Move the parts.

• Migrating files to the new file format
  
  
• Migrating AutoText entries
  
  
• Migrating customizations
  
  
• Migrating Add-ins
  
  
• Migrating AutoCorrect entries
  
  
• Migrating the data key

Labels: Word

A look see

I haven't seen, lately, how many fonts you can have on a machine, but I know it's a lot more than earlier versions.

Here is a free download that will create an HTML file that will show all the fonts installed on your computer.

"Using FontList, you can change the predefined sample text, exclude seldom used fonts from the list and change the path for the HTML file.

In your browser, you can change the style of a font and zoom in on a font. You can also view the character map of a font. And, for some, maybe the most important feature, you can create a print out of all your fonts.

Labels: Word

Copy/Paste formatting in Word, PowerPoint or Excel

Labels: Word

Quick inserts

• Alt Codes for Letters with Accents for Languages
  
• Alt Codes for Bullets, Symbols and Other Special Characters
  
• Alt Codes for Mathematical Symbols - Symbols used in Mathematics
  
• Alt Codes for Currency Symbols
  
• Alt Codes for Drawing
  
• Alt Codes for Characters from the Greek Alphabet
  
• Alt Codes for "Additional" Letters particularly for Nordic / Scandanavian Languages
  
• Alt Codes for Spanish
  
• Intellectual Property Right symbols.
  
• Alt Codes for Arrows
  
• Alt Codes for Punctuation and Editing
  
• Alt Codes in Computer Programming

Labels: Word

Demo tutorial

You can control when Word decides to break for a new page.

Ctrl+Enter is the keyboard shortcut, but there are a number of variations.

This MS link has both Demos and text tutorials.
Page breaks

BTW; a merged document is made up of Section breaks, not Page breaks.

For ease of printing, Replace ^b with ^m



See all Topics

Labels: Word

Here's another good newsletter

Jack M. Lyon, a book editor who got tired of working the hard way and started creating programs to automate editing tasks in Microsoft Word. He's been editing more than twenty years and started working on the computer in 1985.

(Unfortunately has not published recently, but still full of good information)

A few back issues of Editorium Update arranged chronologically:

• Deleting Unused Styles
  
• Pasting Tracked Revisions
  
• Indexing with a Two-Column Concordance
  
• Fancy Sorting
  
• Editing by Concordance
  
• Making a Concordance
  
• Numbers by Chicago
  
• Fixing Typos Automatically

Labels: Word

Not the best features

Katherine Murray from TechRepublic, lists ten word features that can be replaced with the new tools.

#1: The Font dialog box
(She says use Themes, I prefer to control individual components)

#2: Mark As Final
(I agree, it's not that Final)

#3: Save As Word XML
(I agree. "Today’s Word is completely built on Office OpenXML, so now all the files you create and save in Word 2007 are actually saved in XML". )

#4: Mail Merge Wizard
( I agree. Mail merge is not that hard. It is only made more difficult with the Wizard)

#5 Drawing Canvas
(Down with the Canvas!)

#6: Signature Line

#7: Web Tools

#8: Document Map

#9: Microsoft Clip Organizer

#10 Document Properties

10 features you can skip



See all Topics

Labels: Word

Video + Free code

"Learn tips and use sample code for several Office applications. These tips can help you to be more productive and can also be a starting point for developing your own tools, utilities and techniques."

• Update Word Document Statistics in the Title Bar
  
• Create Outlook Rules Programmatically
  
• Delete Repeated Text Throughout a Word Document
  
• Run Macros Based on the Value of One or More Excel Spreadsheet Cells
  
• Disable Related Controls on a PowerPoint Slide After a User Clicks an Input Control
  
• Display Reminder Information When a User Opens an Office Document
  
• Synchronize an Access Main Form to a Subform and Vice Versa
  
• Log Worksheet Changes to an XML File
  
• Merge Body Text from Multiple Outlook E-mail Messages to a Word Document
  
• Use the Office Assistant as an Alternative to Displaying and Retrieving User Input

Labels: Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word

No cost

Labels: Addendum, FrontPage, PowerPoint, Word

More than I want

Try to place an AutoShape on a page and the Drawing Canvas pops up by default.

To turn off this feature, go to:
Tools>Options.
On the General tab, remove the check mark from
"Automatically create drawing canvas when inserting AutoShapes"

To just dismiss it each time, choose your AutoShape and then touch the Delete or Esc key before drawing the object.

Here's some more information.

Wordsite.com:
The draw layer: a metaphysical space

Knowledge Base
General Information About Floating Objects
(a discussion of Word's floating objects and layers)

As I understand it, the Drawing canvas is not really a new layer. The following illustration shows the classic layers. It is from the Knowledge base article:

How to Place Text over a Graphic

                                           ___________________
                                          /                   /
                                         /   <SURFACE OF     /
                                        /       PAPER>      /
                                       /                   /  /
                 Front drawing layer  -------------------  /
                     MAIN TEXT LAYER  =================== / /
                  Back drawing layer  -------------------/ / /
                                                          / /
                 Front drawing layer  -------------------/ /
   (Header/footer) BOTTOM TEXT LAYER  =================== /
                  Back drawing layer  -------------------/

Labels: Word

Make your own stationary

Microsoft Office Online has a group of themed holiday designs.

• Holiday party invitation
  
• Holiday menu
  
• Holiday place cards
  
• Holiday stationery
  
• Holiday thank you card (quarter-fold)
  
• Holiday gift certificate

Labels: Word

Send outline to PowerPoint

For Microsoft Office 2007

Word 2007 doesn't allow you to publish to PowerPoint 2007 by default.
Here's the solution:

After you are done in Word 2007, save it as a Word document.

Now open PowerPoint 2007.

Click on the Office Button at the top left hand corner.

Click Open.

Under Files of type, select All Outlines.

Now select the Word document and click Open.

Alternately,

In Word 2007, right click on the ribbon.

Select Customize Quick Access Toolbar.

Under "Choose commands from:", select Commands not in the ribbon.

Look for "Send to Microsoft Office PowerPoint".

Click OK.

The command will then be added onto the Quick Access Toolbar (QAT).

Labels: PowerPoint, Word

New old feature

Back in the old days minutes, we used "Autotext" to hold chunks of data that could then be reused in other locations and in other documents.

This tool has been polished and given the new name of "Building Blocks".

The Microsoft Office Word Team's Blog:

Part 1 - Building Blocks

Part 2 - Inserting and Swapping Building Blocks

Part 3 - Creating Building Blocks

Part 4 - Deploying Building Blocks

Office.Microsoft.com:
Reuse and distribute parts of a document



See all Topics

Labels: Word

Office Wide

"Automation (formerly known as OLE Automation) is a feature of the Component Object Model (COM), an industry-standard technology that applications use to expose their objects, methods, and properties to development tools, macro languages, and other applications.

For example, a spreadsheet application might expose a worksheet, chart, cell, or range of cells--each as a different type of object. A word processor might expose objects such as an application, document, paragraph, bookmark, or sentence.

When an application supports Automation, the objects that the application exposes can be accessed through Visual Basic. You can use Visual Basic to manipulate the objects by invoking methods or by getting and setting properties of the objects."

Here's an example:

Inserting Data into a Microsoft Word Document

With Automation code, you can open a Microsoft Word document and move to a bookmark location in the document. The following example opens a Microsoft Word document and inserts text after a bookmark.

This example assumes that you have Microsoft Word on your computer, that you have an existing document called C:\My Documents\WordTest.doc, and that the document contains a pre-defined bookmark named City.

Sub FindBMark()

   Dim wordApp As Word.Application
   Dim wordDoc As Word.Document
   Dim wordRange As Word.Range

   Set wordApp = CreateObject("Word.Application")
   Set wordDoc = wordApp.Documents.Open("C:\My Documents\Wordtest.doc")

   wordApp.Visible = True

   ' Go to the bookmark named "City".
   Set wordRange = wordDoc.Goto(What:=wdGoToBookmark, Name:="City")
   wordRange.InsertAfter "Los Angeles"

   ' Print the document.
   wordDoc.PrintOut Background:=False

   ' Save the modified document.
   wordDoc.Save

   ' Quit Word without saving changes to the document.
   wordApp.Quit SaveChanges:=wdDoNotSaveChanges

   Set wordApp = Nothing

End Sub

Microsoft Support provides an entire Help file to assist you. It includes theory and examples.

The file is called XPAutomation.chm.

Download it and then double click on the file to run it. You could also set up a shortcut on the desk top, if it will be used frequently.


Microsoft Knowledge Base Article: 302460

This was aimed at Office 2002 but it can be used with later versions:

• Microsoft Access
  
• Microsoft Excel
  
• Microsoft Outlook
  
• Microsoft PowerPoint
  
• Microsoft Word

Labels: Access, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word

2007 gives you more than you ask for

"(A) lesson here for me is that lots of people seem to think of Word as a typewriter (remember typewriters?). There are many examples of this, in the way people construct a table of contents for their Word documents, use the TAB key to align columns, and the way they always hit ENTER twice after typing each paragraph (for those who are fans of extra space between paragraphs).

Many, many of the feedback comments on the line-spacing issue had to do with wanting "single spacing." But, of course the line spacing in the new template is single spacing. It's just that it's a little bit "more" than single spacing used to be: 1.15, instead of 1.0.

But what is 1.0? You might think that if you're using an 11-point font that line spacing of 1.0 would be 11 points. But if you lay out paragraphs that way - depending on the font you're using - the parts that stick below one line will crash into the parts that stick up from the line below. You need to allow some extra space between lines.

In a former life when I set type on a Compugraphic phototypesetting machine, the convention we used was about 20% extra space, so we'd set 10-point type on a 12-point line. Larger fonts demanded more breathing room. This was at a newspaper, so we spaced things a bit tighter than you'd expect to see in, say, a report or a brochure (or, dare I say a professional looking document).

Labels: Word

Exchange the future and the past

"Microsoft has added new file formats to Microsoft Office Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007. To help ensure that you can exchange documents between Microsoft Office releases, Microsoft has developed a Compatibility Pack for the Office Word, Office Excel, and Office PowerPoint 2007 File Formats"

Use earlier versions of Excel, PowerPoint, and Word to open and save files from 2007 Office programs

Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007



See all Topics

Labels: Excel, PowerPoint, Word

You can lead a tab to ...........

Fred Smith.........................$44.59

This makes your list easier to read

1. Select the line on which you want to create a tab
   
   
2. Click on the Format menu and click on the Tabs menu item
   (you will see the Tabs dialog box)
   
   
3. In the Tab Stop Position field enter the distance to the last column: 5", 6" or what ever is appropriate
   
   
4. Then select the tab alignment; Decimal, Right, Center or Left
   
   
5. Select the type of leader to use
   
   
6. Click Set and then OK
   

Enter the name, or first entry, and then touch the Tab key.

Word will automatically enter as many leading characters as required.

When you can type the amount, it will be aligned on the decimal or any other alignment you might have chosen.

Here's what it looks like in Word 2007

Also:

University of Florida handout:
Word Tabs Doc

WordTips Online Answers:
Tips on Word tabs

OfficeLetter.com:
Favorite Word tips #2

About.com:
Creating Tab Leader Lines

Fab Tabs
Uncover the magic of using tabs

[Edited entry from 10/11/2004]




See all Topics

Labels: Word

It can make life easier

Labels: Word

We all have to start somewhere

Here is a 30 minute course:

After completing this course you will be able to:

• Create and save a document.
  
• Accept or reject suggested revisions for spelling and grammar as you type.
  
• Change page margins.
  
• Adjust spacing by deleting any extra spaces between words or extra lines between paragraphs.

Labels: Word