"redefine style" irreparably resets modified styles

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Ron Conescu - 09 Mar 2004 05:04 GMT

I'm having a problem with the Redefine Style command. Effectively,
when I redefine a style, Word seems to perform a "Reset Paragraph"
command on every paragraph whose style is a minor modification of that
style. The problem seems specific to Word 2002.

Here is an example which will illustrate the problem.

1. Create a blank Word document.

2. Type at least 3 paragraphs of text. For example, these paragraphs
will work:

This is a test.
This is my dog, Spot.
He is cute.

3. Turn on bullets for at least one of those paragraphs. For
example, click in the "Spot" paragraph, and click the Bullets button
in the toolbar. Leave at least one paragraph in the unmodified Normal
style.

4. Select a word in a Normal paragraph. For example, select the word
"test" above.

5. Change its font size -- say, from 12pt. to 15 pt.

6. With that word selected, redefine the Normal style, so that all
Normal paragraphs become 15 point.

Here's the problem:
7. The *bulleted* paragraph loses its bullet.

It doesn't matter what changes I've made to my current paragraph, or
what modifications have been made to the other paragraphs; Redefine
Style now erases all my modifications to other paragraphs. It also
doesn't matter where the pargraphs are located--they don't have to be
adjacent for this problem to occur. The problem does *not* seem to
affect styles which I have defined as their own style; it only affects
slightly-modified versions of a base style.

In addition, the problem cannot be Undone, for two reasons:
- the (apparent) Reset Paragraph command is not appearing in the Undo
menu.
- the Redefine Style command no longer appears in the Undo menu.

In my experience, this behavior is new to Word 2002. I've been using
Word for about 20 years, and Redefine Style for about 12 years; I have
not seen this situation before. I have tried turning off every
AutoCorrect option I can find, singly and in various combinations, so
far without success.

I hope this explanation has been clear. I would greatly appreciate
any suggestions. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Ron Conescu

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Shauna Kelly - 09 Mar 2004 09:26 GMT

Hi Ron

> I hope this explanation has been clear.

Impressively clear!

I can't reproduce your experience in Word 2002. The bulleted paragraph stays
bulleted, and the Edit > Undo list says "Undo Style".

Have you downloaded the patches for Word 2002?

Hope this helps.

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word

> I'm having a problem with the Redefine Style command. Effectively,
> when I redefine a style, Word seems to perform a "Reset Paragraph"
[quoted text clipped - 51 lines]
>
> Ron Conescu

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Klaus Linke - 09 Mar 2004 19:27 GMT

Hi Ron,

For what it's worth, I can reproduce your results both in Word2002 and 2003.

I'll look some more, but it seems that the "RedefineStyle" command is buggy
in Word2002/2003.
Redefining a style shouldn't touch manual formatting. But it seems that
"RedefineStyle" removes all manual formatting from all paragraphs formatted
in that style.

It sure didn't work like this up to Word2000, and whoever thought it a good
idea to change this must have ample access to psychedelic chemicals.

Regards,
Klaus

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Klaus Linke - 09 Mar 2004 19:53 GMT

Hi Ron,

For the time being, you might consider using your own code for
"RedefineStyle".

The following macro should intercept "RedefineStyle":

Sub RedefineStyle()
For Each Style In ActiveDocument.Styles
If Selection.Style.NameLocal = Style.NameLocal Then
Select Style.Type
Case wdStyleTypeParagraph
Style.ParagraphFormat = Selection.Paragraphs(1).Format
Style.Font = Selection.Font
Case wdStyleTypeParagraph
Style.Font = Selection.Font
End Select
End If
Next Style
End Sub

I ran into problems trying to add Borders, Shading, and Frame to the things
that are redefined. Maybe I'm doing something wrong, or maybe there are more
bugs to work around. I haven't even attempted to treat table styles and list
styles, or numbered styles.

Regards,
Klaus

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Charles Kenyon - 09 Mar 2004 21:44 GMT

I've been using Word for less time than you have and have very little
experience with the Undo list. I seldom use it. I have not heard of
"redefine style" except in the context of the dialog that pops up when I
want to re-apply a style to a paragraph that is already set in that style
with modifications. Then I am given the option of re-applying the style or
(default) redefining the style to match the selection.

I'm familiar with and use "Modify Style" in the styles dialog.

I do have the option "prompt to modify style" checked on the editing options
page.

I know you have looked at the AutoCorrect options, but do you have the
following option on the AutoFormat as you type page unchecked?

Define styles based on your formatting

Don't know if that helps, or not, but it sounds like what is going on for
you.

Signature

Charles Kenyon

See the MVP FAQ: <URL: http://www.mvps.org/word/> which is awesome!
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> I'm having a problem with the Redefine Style command. Effectively,
> when I redefine a style, Word seems to perform a "Reset Paragraph"
[quoted text clipped - 51 lines]
>
> Ron Conescu

Reply to this Message

Ron Conescu - 15 Mar 2004 22:31 GMT

Folks,

Thanks for your suggestions. Specific replies follow:

Shauna, I went to microsoft.com, and had the on-line tool suggest
which updates to apply. It dowloaded and installed two patches,
including Office XP SP3, but the problem is not fixed. My copy of
Word is now at this version:

Microsoft Word 2002 (10.6612.6626) SP3

Is this what you have?

Shauna and Klaus, both: do you have any ideas why Shauna might NOT be
experiencing this, but Klaus and I are? E.g., might our respective
versions of Windows (and, thus, the correspondingly compiled versions
of Word) have something to do with it? I'm running Win2K Client
Professional; what are you guys using?

Klaus: Thanks for verifying that it's not just me. I didn't know we
could override the built-in commands; that's terrific! (Can I do that
with all of them? Just use the names from the "Customize Keyboard"
dialog box?) Since I *do* depend on Word to propagate the other
styles -- borders, etc. -- I'm still going to see if I can find a
"real" fix. But if I can't, I'll adapt your solution.

Charles -- yes, that option is turned off, although I tested it just
to be sure. Thanks.

Thanks, all. Your continued suggestions are very welcome.

ron

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Klaus Linke - 16 Mar 2004 06:15 GMT

Hi Ron,

> Shauna and Klaus, both: do you have any ideas why Shauna might
> NOT be experiencing this, but Klaus and I are? [...]

Not sure, but perhaps Shauna redefined the style from the interface some way
that didn't run the "RedefineStyle" command at all?

> Klaus: Thanks for verifying that it's not just me. I didn't know
> we could override the built-in commands; that's terrific! (Can I
> do that with all of them? Just use the names from the "Customize
> Keyboard" dialog box?)

Yes, in principle, though you might run into problems with quite a few of
them.
Since it's documented nowhere what the commands do exactly, it is often
difficult to write a macro replacing some command that doesn't cause
problems down the way.
If you're interested to look into the possibilities,
http://word.mvps.org/faqs/general/CommandsList.htm
by Dave Rado, and Lisa Wollin's
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnword2k2/html/
odc_wdoverride.asp
have some more info, ressources, and links.

Greetings,
Klaus

Reply to this Message

Shauna Kelly - 16 Mar 2004 16:43 GMT

>> Not sure, but perhaps Shauna redefined the style from the interface some

way

> that didn't run the "RedefineStyle" command at all?

In the first post, I translated "Redefine Style" to "Modify style".
Modifying the style using the old Format > Styles dialog did not reproduce
the problem. But obviously I wasn't trying hard enough<g>.

Shauna

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word

> Hi Ron,
>
[quoted text clipped - 17 lines]
> http://word.mvps.org/faqs/general/CommandsList.htm
> by Dave Rado, and Lisa Wollin's

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnword2k2/html/
odc_wdoverride.asp

> have some more info, ressources, and links.
>
> Greetings,
> Klaus

Reply to this Message

Ron Conescu - 22 Mar 2004 18:44 GMT

> In the first post, I translated "Redefine Style" to "Modify style".
> Modifying the style using the old Format > Styles dialog did not reproduce
> the problem. But obviously I wasn't trying hard enough<g>.

Shauna,

I would be curious to know whether you've been able to reproduce the
error, since you last wrote. Also, what version of Word are you
using? Are you at the same version I mentioned in message 6 of this
thread?

Thanks.

ron

Reply to this Message

Ron Conescu - 22 Mar 2004 18:47 GMT

> > I didn't know
> > we could override the built-in commands; that's terrific! (Can I
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> Yes, in principle, though you might run into problems with quite a few of
> them. [...] If you're interested to look into the possibilities, [...]

Will do. Thanks, very much.

> Since it's documented nowhere what the commands do exactly, it is often
> difficult to write a macro replacing some command that doesn't cause
> problems down the way.

:-) Ah. I *was* wondering how we were "supposed" to know. Got it.

Any further thoughts on this "redefine style" thing?

ron

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Bob S - 24 Mar 2004 16:14 GMT

>Any further thoughts on this "redefine style" thing?

I seem to recall seeing someone (it might have been Suzanne S.
Barnhill) mentioning in another thread that "in recent versions of
Word you cannot redefine the Normal style by example". Whoever it was
didn't say what happened if you tried it; maybe you have found out.

Does the problem only infest the Normal style, or does it occur on
other styles also?

Bob S

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Suzanne S. Barnhill - 24 Mar 2004 16:29 GMT

In Word 97 and above, if you apply direct formatting to Normal style, then
reselect the style in the Style dropdown, you do not get the usual dialog
asking whether you want to redefine the style or reset the paragraph. You
must instead go to Format | Style | Modify and make changes there. This is
probably intended as removal of a trap for the unwary, but it is a
considerable nuisance. OTOH, it's generally a good idea *not* to modify
Normal style anyway (and to use Body Text for body text), so it is a minor
inconvenience.

That is what I meant by "redefining by example." I don't know how this works
with the Redefine Style command on a toolbar, but I do know that in Word
2002/2003 "Update to Match Selection" in the Styles & Formatting pane (which
is the equivalent of redefining by example) is not available for Normal
style.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)

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Word MVP FAQ site: http://www.word.mvps.org
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> >Any further thoughts on this "redefine style" thing?
>
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
>
> Bob S

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Bob S - 24 Mar 2004 18:30 GMT

>Any further thoughts on this "redefine style" thing?

One other thing that I noticed...

In your directions on how to create the problem you are redefining a
paragraph style based on a single word selection. If you select the
entire paragraph including the paragraph mark, apply your font
formatting, and then try to redefine the Normal style based on the
whole paragraph selection, do you still get the odd results?

Bob S

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