Back in January 2003 I published an article called "WordPerfect Weirdness," which featured a macro for converting "special" characters (dashes, quotation marks, and the like) in a file imported from WordPerfect to Word. You can read the article here:
http://lists.topica.com/lists/editorium/read/message.html?mid=1711839353
Unfortunately, the macro isn't reliable with more recent versions of Word, and I needed an updated version (some of those authors are still using WordPerfect). If you need one too, here it is (for PC or Macintosh; yes, it still has some WordBasic in it):
'THE MACRO STARTS HERE
Sub FixWPWeirdness()
' Courtesy of The Editorium (www.editorium.com)
Dim a
Dim i
Dim FalseChar$
Dim TrueChar$
Dim ThisChar
Selection.HomeKey Unit:=wdStory
Selection.Find.ClearFormatting
Selection.Find.Replacement.ClearFormatting
'Check for platform
a = InStr(WordBasic.[AppInfo$](1), "Macintosh")
For i = 1 To 6
'Set find and replace variables
Select Case i
Case 1
FalseChar$ = "C"
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(209)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(151)
End If
Case 2
FalseChar$ = "B"
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(208)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(150)
End If
Case 3
FalseChar$ = "A"
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(210)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(147)
End If
Case 4
FalseChar$ = "@"
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(211)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(148)
End If
Case 5
FalseChar$ = ">"
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(212)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(145)
End If
Case 6
FalseChar$ = "="
If a Then
TrueChar$ = Chr(213)
Else
TrueChar$ = Chr(146)
End If
Case Else
End Select
'Find and replace characters
With Selection.Find
.Text = FalseChar$
.Forward = True
.Wrap = wdFindContinue
.Format = False
.MatchCase = True
.MatchWholeWord = False
.MatchWildcards = False
.MatchSoundsLike = False
.MatchAllWordForms = False
End With
Selection.Find.Execute
While WordBasic.EditFindFound()
ThisChar = Asc(WordBasic.[Selection$]())
If ThisChar = 40 Then
WordBasic.EditClear
WordBasic.Insert TrueChar$
End If
Selection.Find.Execute
Wend
Next i
End Sub
'THE MACRO ENDS HERE
If you don't know how to use such macros, you'll find instructions here:
http://lists.topica.com/lists/editorium/read/message.html?mid=1706922855
For ease of use, you might want to attach the macro to a keyboard shortcut, as explained here:
http://lists.topica.com/lists/editorium/read/message.html?mid=1713088939
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READERS WRITE
The newsletter for February 9 featured an article called "Macros for Intuitively Reviewing Tracked Revisions":
http://lists.topica.com/lists/editorium/read/message.html?mid=1719923701
After reading the article, Hilary Powers wrote:
Regarding your tracking-review macros: I think they'd drive me crazy. Maybe I've been doing this too long, but my thought process runs purely to "keep this change" and "don't keep this change" without reference to whether the underlying text will thereby be restored or removed.
This probably works for me because I never, ever review each and every revision and decide upon its fate individually.
When I go through an edited manuscript after the author has indicated what should happen to it, I first move from one of the author's comments or adjustments to the next, eyeballing for the author's tracking color. In each case, I fix that part of the manuscript so it does what the author wants (which may or may not be precisely what the author asked for). In the process, I try to delete all the queries I've put into the text.
Then I simply approve all the changes remaining in the manuscript, holus bolus--after which I have a whole array of very quick scans to make sure that no queries escaped and nothing else bad happened as a result.
For me, that's intuitive.
Many thanks to Hilary.
_________________________________________
RESOURCES
The U.S. Department of Labor Bureau offers interesting occupational and salary information for writers and editors:
http://www.bls.gov/oco/print/ocos089.htm
