If you use Microsoft Word, I guarantee you've been frustrated by its formatting, especially if you edit someone else's documents. For example, you modify the Heading 1 style to use Palatino rather than Arial--but Arial it remains. What's going on here?<\/p>\n
Consider my living room wall, which I daringly painted red. Then, coming to my senses, I painted it grayish green. But wait . . . What *was* I thinking? Finally, I covered it with an almond color that looked okay.<\/p>\n
Microsoft Word's formatting works pretty much the same way. It's done in layers, like paint on a wall.<\/p>\n
The underlying layer is the formatting of paragraph styles. For example, if you apply the Heading 1 paragraph style using Word's defaults, your text will be formatted in 16-point Arial bold. If you attach a new template to your document (and check the box labeled \"Automatically Update Document Styles\"), the formatting of Heading 1 will change to whatever is specified in the new template (18-point Baskerville italic, for example). Note that this doesn't change the style formatting in your Normal template. It just paints over that formatting *in your document.* And if you \"detach\" the new template, the formatting won't change back. Once the paint is on there, it's on there. Of course, you can always attach a *different* template or modify the styles in the document itself if you want to change the formatting yet again.<\/p>\n
The next layer up is the formatting of character styles. You can use character styles to format text selections smaller than a paragraph. For example, you might use a character style called Book Title to format book titles in Times Roman italic. Like paragraph styles, character styles can be changed by attaching a different template or modifying the styles in the document itself.<\/p>\n
Finally, on the topmost layer, your document could have directly applied formatting. That's what you get if you simply select some text and apply, say, 18-point Baskerville italic without using a style. In all but the simplest documents, this kind of formatting is of the devil. Why? Because you can't change it simply by modifying the underlying style--and that means you have no way to control it (or even identify it) *throughout* the document. So, if you modify the Heading 1 style to use Palatino rather than Arial--well, Arial it remains.<\/p>\n
How can you avoid this problem in your documents?<\/p>\n
1. Don't use directly applied formatting.<\/p>\n
2. Use character styles to format text selections smaller than a paragraph.<\/p>\n
3. Use paragraph styles to format everything else.<\/p>\n
4. To change your formatting, modify the *style* that produces it.<\/p>\n
But what if you're working on someone else's documents? You'll probably want to remove all that directly applied formatting and use styles instead. But that's a topic for another day.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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READERS WRITE<\/p>\n
Rich Shattenberg (shatts@world.cbi.org) wrote:<\/p>\n
\"I don't have a hint but I have a question and a problem. I live in the country of Madagascar. There is no Word spell checker for the Malagasy language, or at least I have not yet been able to find one. I have made a custom dictionary with about 7,000 words to do spell checks in Malagasy. However, here is the challenge.<\/p>\n
\"The word 'mandeha' means 'to go' (present tense), 'Nandeha' is past tense, and 'handeha' is future tense. For the custom dictionary, I have to enter all three words. I have not yet been able to find wildcard symbols to use in the custom dictionary.<\/p>\n
\"For example, is there a way of telling the custom dictionary to accept the word 'andeha' if there is either a 'm' or 'n' or 'h' in front of the word. This would mean I only have to make one entry for the three words.\"<\/p>\n
I'm researching this, but do you, gentle reader, have an answer (or other questions, hints, or comments you'd like to share)? If so, please send me an email message here: mailto:hints [at symbol] editorium.com<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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RESOURCES<\/p>\n
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