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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
I just discovered Styles today, and I am attempting to get up to speed by reading what Shauna Kelly has to say about them at http://tinyurl.com/ybqf .
I also have an existing document, a portion of which can be downloaded from http://petersale.com/word/, the file is 040724Styles01.doc, that was originally created without using any styles. I'm attempting to "re-format" it using Styles. I don't actually want to change the way it looks. I am quite satisfied with its appearance. I just want to make it look the way it looks via styles rather. This document upgrade is proving to be quite a challenge. For example, even though I did not knowingly use styles in the creation of this document, Format=Styles and Formatting ... and Show: Formatting in use show a variety of "styles" with names like Style 9 pt Centered or After: 6 pt. I imagine this is the sort of thing you get if you manually format stuff without actually using styles? In any case, any pointers on how to "convert" this nice looking document into a document that remains "nice looking" but utilizes styles would be much appreciated? -- Peter Sale Santa Monica, CA USA To email me, just pull 'my-leg.' |
#2
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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
Hi Peter
What you're seeing listed in the Styles and Formatting task pane are not, as you suspected, styles. They're a description of a combination of style + direct formatting that you've used in the document. For more info about that, see How the Styles and Formatting pane works in Word 2002 and 2003 http://www.ShaunaKelly.com/word/sfpa...ttingPane.html To re-format your document using styles, you basically have two choices. The result will be the same: the choice depends on how you would prefer to work. In both cases, it's a good idea to make a backup copy before you begin. The "Brute Force" method is to print out your document, so you have a copy of the formatting to which you can refer. If necessary, write on the paper copy to indicate particular formatting (eg this was Arial 13pt with 4 points space after the paragraph). Now, ctrl-a to select the whole document, ctrl-Shift-N to put it all in normal style (or, apply whatever style you intend to use for the body text, eg style Body Text), then ctrl-q and ctr-spacebar to remove all direct formatting. You'll now have a completely clean slate on which to work. Apply your styles as required. The "Top Down" method is to start by applying style Heading 1 to the major headings, and modify Heading 1 to suit your needs. Then apply Heading 2 to the sub-headings, and so on. If I'm doing this, I would probably work in Outline View, so I can concentrate on one part of the document, at a time. Don't forget that Word has built-in shortcuts for the main heading styles (Alt-Ctrl-1, Alt-Ctrl-2 etc). And F4 will repeat the last command you used. So if you just applied a style to a paragraph, you can apply the same style to another paragraph by using F4. Hope this helps. Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP. http://www.shaunakelly.com/word "Peter Sale" wrote in message ... I just discovered Styles today, and I am attempting to get up to speed by reading what Shauna Kelly has to say about them at http://tinyurl.com/ybqf . I also have an existing document, a portion of which can be downloaded from http://petersale.com/word/, the file is 040724Styles01.doc, that was originally created without using any styles. I'm attempting to "re-format" it using Styles. I don't actually want to change the way it looks. I am quite satisfied with its appearance. I just want to make it look the way it looks via styles rather. This document upgrade is proving to be quite a challenge. For example, even though I did not knowingly use styles in the creation of this document, Format=Styles and Formatting ... and Show: Formatting in use show a variety of "styles" with names like Style 9 pt Centered or After: 6 pt. I imagine this is the sort of thing you get if you manually format stuff without actually using styles? In any case, any pointers on how to "convert" this nice looking document into a document that remains "nice looking" but utilizes styles would be much appreciated? -- Peter Sale Santa Monica, CA USA To email me, just pull 'my-leg.' |
#3
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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
If you have specific attributes of a paragraph that you can easily search one, this might be worth your while to try:
1. Click on the desired heading or line that you want to assign a style (let's say you have a title line that is bold and 14 point. Click inside the style dropdown box (not on the arrow, but on the actual box), type a Style name (like MyTitle), then press ENTER. You just created a style based on that line. 2. Click "Edit", "Replace". Click the "More" button. Click inside the "Find What" box. Click the "Format" button and select Font". 3. Click the Font and/or size that you know exists for this new Style. 4. Click in side the "Replace with" box. Click the "Format" button and select "Styles". 5. Select the desired Style and click "Replace All". Your existing title lines will be replaced only with the given Style name allowing you to do things like easily create TOCs, etc. Good Luck! -- Bill Foley, Microsoft MVP (PowerPoint) Microsoft Office Specialist Master Instructor www.pttinc.com Check out PPT FAQs at: http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/ "Success, something you measure when you are through succeeding." "Peter Sale" wrote in message ... I just discovered Styles today, and I am attempting to get up to speed by reading what Shauna Kelly has to say about them at http://tinyurl.com/ybqf . I also have an existing document, a portion of which can be downloaded from http://petersale.com/word/, the file is 040724Styles01.doc, that was originally created without using any styles. I'm attempting to "re-format" it using Styles. I don't actually want to change the way it looks. I am quite satisfied with its appearance. I just want to make it look the way it looks via styles rather. This document upgrade is proving to be quite a challenge. For example, even though I did not knowingly use styles in the creation of this document, Format=Styles and Formatting ... and Show: Formatting in use show a variety of "styles" with names like Style 9 pt Centered or After: 6 pt. I imagine this is the sort of thing you get if you manually format stuff without actually using styles? In any case, any pointers on how to "convert" this nice looking document into a document that remains "nice looking" but utilizes styles would be much appreciated? -- Peter Sale Santa Monica, CA USA To email me, just pull 'my-leg.' |
#4
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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
Many thanks Shauna. I will give your suggestions a try.
-- Regards, Peter Sale Santa Monica, CA USA To email me, just pull 'my-leg.' |
#5
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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
Hi Bill,
I will also give your suggestions a try. -- Many Thanks, Peter Sale Santa Monica, CA USA To email me, just pull 'my-leg.' |
#6
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How to correct and/or add styles to an existing document?
Hi Peter,
Whether Word treats manual formatting similar to styles depends on "Tools Options Edit Keep track of formatting". It's probably checked on your machine, and that is the best setting if you want to use styles in the future. I'd also choose "Custom" at the bottom of the "Styles and formatting" pane, and check everything in that dialog. The goal is now to reduce the long list to a couple of properly defined styles. First, you can get rid of the styles you don't really use. Using a macro is the simplest way to do that. I pasted the one I use below. You probably just want to keep about four or so paragraph styles, those that are used a lot. You can right-click Modify on a style in the pane to give it a better name (for example "Section title" instead of "Style 12 pt centered bold"). Most times, it's better to name styles according to their use (say "House Rules paragraphs" or "Signatures") rather than according to the formatting. Next, check whether you really want to keep the used paragraph styles (those with the ¶ at the right). Right-click on them, and you see how often they are used. "Select all x instances" shows you where they are used. For example, "Style 12 pt bold" and "Style 12 pt centered 1" are both only used once. They look about the same, so you can apply one of them to both paragraphs and delete the other. You can also get rid of some styles that are only used for empty paragraphs. You can keep for example one style for paragraphs with first line indents and "space after 6 pt", one for those with no indent and 6 pt after, another one for those with hanging indents and line spacing "at least 18 pt", etc. Then you can check whether the paragraph styles are used consistently: You can again select everything that is formatted in some style with right-click on the style name "Select all x instances". If not all paragraphs that should look the same are formatted in the same paragraph style, you can apply the proper style. You can probably also safely remove the rest of manual paragraph formatting with Ctrl+Q. If the paragraph formatting doesn't look quite right after Ctrl+Q, you now can apply the proper formatting through the style definition. Most manual character formatting is ok (such as bold, italic, underlined). Only if you have character formatting that's always applied to the whole paragraph (like a certain font, or bold headings), it should be part of the paragraph style's definition, and you can remove manual character formatting with Ctrl+Spacebar. Once you have defined a proper set of paragraph styles, you can usually keep "Show: Custom Other formatting Font formatting" unchecked, since you are only interested in paragraph styles. Hope that helps you a bit, Klaus Sub DeleteUnusedStyles() ' stops and asks whether you want to keep/delete a style ' most times, you probably want to answer "yes" to keep ' styles that are in use, and selete those that aren't. Dim myStyle As Style For Each myStyle In ActiveDocument.Styles If myStyle.InUse Then Select Case myStyle Case ActiveDocument.Styles(wdStyleDefaultParagraphFont) Case ActiveDocument.Styles(wdStyleNormal) Case ActiveDocument.Styles(wdStyleNormalTable) Case ActiveDocument.Styles(wdStyleHeading1) To _ ActiveDocument.Styles(wdStyleHeading9) Case Else Selection.Collapse (wdCollapseStart) With Selection.Find .ClearFormatting .Style = myStyle .Forward = True .Wrap = wdFindContinue .Execute FindText:="", Format:=True If .Found = False Then StatusBar = myStyle.NameLocal If MsgBox("Delete?", vbYesNo, myStyle.NameLocal) = vbYes Then myStyle.Delete End If Else If MsgBox("Keep?", vbYesNo, myStyle.NameLocal) = vbNo Then myStyle.Delete End If End If End With End Select End If Next myStyle End Sub |
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