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MS Office Forum / Word / Long Documents / March 2004Styles, templates, multiple docs, multiple versions
I am working on a text book written by two older academics who are not really computer literate. One is using Mac Word X, the other some older version of Windows Word. I am using Windows Word 2002. They send chapters they've written, and I'm trying to clean up the formatting, add real graphics, and do the page layout/design work. One problem is that these guys don't create styles to apply formating - they just click on the whatever format buttons happen to be visible in their tool bars. So the documents (there are 25 so far) are coming to me with hundreds of automatically created styles of mysterious provenance and with uncertain linking, often applied to only one sentence or one word; and multiple incompatible numbered and bulleted lists. I am trying to figure out a way to apply my styles and bullet lists to all these documents, and to get rid of all the bad formatting. I've tried attaching my customized template, but that only adds my formating to any styles in their documents that happen to have the same names as styles in my template. I've tried using the organizer to delete all their styles and copy my styles in, but it has unpredictable results. I've even tried clearing and re-formatting entire documents, but that is incredibly time consuming, and very difficult to get right. One other problem - even as I am reformatting these documents, the professors continue to work on them, and since they're really bad at revision control, I will have to make the changes to the same documents many times. I thought I was pretty good with Word, having used it since version 2, but I am totally out of my league on this. Can anyone suggest a solution? Thanks, j PS: Unfortunately, it's not possible to change the behavior of the authors. I've tried, believe me, but it's taken them so long to learn how to make text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any further change. Some random thoughts... - Maybe you could make some style buttons for them. ;-) - Use a multiple monitor system. It's really handy to be able to see both docs at the same time while you're cleaning up. - I use PureText, a utility that converts rich text on the clipboard to plain text. I select the text in one document, copy it, mash the hotkey, and paste it in the other document as unformatted text. Very handy. http://www.stevemiller.net/ - You could probably make some macros to recognize the formatting and make them into styles, but the details of how to do that are beyond my experience. HTH. -- Mark > I am working on a text book written by two older academics who are not > really computer literate. One is using Mac Word X, the other some [quoted text clipped - 37 lines] > how to make text bold using the little icons that they're totally > resistant to any further change. Make sure you have hard copy so that you know what their original formatting intentions were. Then do the following: 1. For each chunk of text you get, select all but the last paragraph mark and paste it into a new document based on your template. 2. Ctrl+A, Ctrl+Q, Ctrl+Spacebar, Ctrl+Shift+N (probably just the last will do, actually). 3. Now that you have a clean slate, go through and tag the text with your styles. Yes, it's tedious, but it's the only way. I prepare camera-ready copy for books, and when I get electronic manuscript files, I follow exactly this process to sanitize the text (and keep myself sane). As for the later revisions, either just don't start until editing is complete, or ask them to mark all revisions so that you can transfer them manually (or at least copy/paste individual revised paragraphs into your formatted document. After reading your lament, I guess I should count myself lucky that the last time I worked with professors, they were such troglodytes that they wouldn't go near a computer. I either started from scratch, with hard copy prepared by their secretaries/wives or at least was able to give simple instructions to the secretaries/wives for preparing a "clean" manuscript! -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word)  SignatureWords into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://www.word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. > I am working on a text book written by two older academics who are not > really computer literate. One is using Mac Word X, the other some older [quoted text clipped - 35 lines] > text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > further change. Suzanne (and et al): So, now I'm coverting everything to plain text, and will then re-apply my styles. One gotcha - these documents are filled with end-notes (85-100 per document). When I converted to plain text, I lost the superscripting for the end-note reference numbers, and the links to the actual end-note text. Is there anyway to get that back? Or is there some method I should be using to preserve them when I 'm converting to text? Thanks, j PS: I've spent some time in your neck of the woods - used to stop there on my way from Nola to the panhandle. Sure do miss it now that I'm up in the cold northeast. > Make sure you have hard copy so that you know what their original formatting > intentions were. Then do the following: [quoted text clipped - 80 lines] > > text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > > further change. Finding all endnote marks and Replacing them with nothing but the Format set to Endnote Reference Style should fix the appearance--the links should still exist, are you sure they don't? DM > Suzanne (and et al): > [quoted text clipped - 107 lines] >>> text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any >>> further change. Yeah, I'm sure. The document formats were so messed up that I converted to a text document then back to Word. If I can't reestablish the links, I'll go back to the original documents and start again from there. J > Finding all endnote marks and Replacing them with nothing but the Format set > to Endnote Reference Style should fix the appearance--the links should still [quoted text clipped - 113 lines] > >>> text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > >>> further change. Converting to plain text would definitely make a hash of the endnotes. That's a bit more drastic than I would advise. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) SignatureWords into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://www.word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. > Yeah, I'm sure. > [quoted text clipped - 148 lines] > > >>> text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > > >>> further change. Right, I misunderstood. Sorry. Perhaps someone else will know for sure whether there's a way to keep notes in such a conversion, my suspicion is plain text formats don't support notes at all. Were the commands Suzanne suggested not drastic enough in removing applied formatting? DM > Yeah, I'm sure. > [quoted text clipped - 148 lines] >>>>> text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any >>>>> further change. No, the commands worked fine. I thought it would be easier to just batch convert the whole mess to text, but I guess not. Thanks. > Right, I misunderstood. Sorry. Perhaps someone else will know for sure > whether there's a way to keep notes in such a conversion, my suspicion is [quoted text clipped - 157 lines] > >>>>> text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > >>>>> further change. Would you mind explaining what you're achieving with: >2. Ctrl+A, Ctrl+Q, Ctrl+Spacebar, Ctrl+Shift+N (probably just the last will >do, actually). I'm new to Word and so don't recognize these keystrokes. thanks. Chip > Make sure you have hard copy so that you know what their original formatting > intentions were. Then do the following: [quoted text clipped - 80 lines] > > text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > > further change. Hi Chip, It's a bit weird to answer a question about keystrokes with another keystroke (especially if that keystroke is a bit obscure), but there you go: Use Alt + Ctrl + Num+ (Hold down Alt, hold down Ctrl at the same time, type the "+" on the numeric keypad on the right of your keyboard) The cursor should turn into a cloverleaf (= control symbol). Now use any keyboard shortcut, and a dialog will show you the name of the command, a description of what it does, and other keyboard shortcuts currently assigned to that command. It also works for keyboard shortcuts to macros or styles or symbols or AutoText. If you click with the cloverleaf on any menu item or toolbar button, it will tell you about the commands that are run by these menu items and buttons, too. Greetings, Klaus > Would you mind explaining what you're achieving with: > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Chip thank you, very unusual and I think it will be quite helpful. Chip > Hi Chip, > [quoted text clipped - 29 lines] > > > > Chip Klaus has given you good advice for fishing, but here's the fish: Ctrl+A selects the entire document. Ctrl+Q removes direct paragraph formatting (resetting paragraph formatting to the default for the style). Ctrl+Spacebar does the same for direct font formatting. Ctrl+Shift+N applies Normal style. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) SignatureWords into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://www.word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. > Would you mind explaining what you're achieving with: > [quoted text clipped - 100 lines] > > > text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > > > further change. thank you, I can see this would be very helpful when someone has made a complete hash out of their doc. Chip > Klaus has given you good advice for fishing, but here's the fish: > [quoted text clipped - 136 lines] > > > > text bold using the little icons that they're totally resistant to any > > > > further change. |
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