 |
 | Home | Contact Us | FAQ | Search & Site Map | Link to Us |
 | Sign In | Join | Other 45 Sites in Network |
| HomeDiscussionsAccessExcelInfoPathOutlookPowerPointPublisherWordDirectoryUser Groups Related Topics Outlook ExpressInternet ExplorerWindowsMS Server ProductsMore Topics ... |
MS Office Forum / Word / Long Documents / April 2006Layout tips for "side boxes"
Hi, I'm laying out a long report (~120 pages) in Word and would like to set up what I call "side boxes", though I don't know the official typographical name for them. For an example of what I'm talking about, look at this document: http://hdr.undp.org/reports/global/2005/pdf/HDR05_chapter_5.pdf on page 158 (11), look at Box 5.3. I will probably have 20 boxes in the document overall. So, I have a couple of questions on how to set this up. 1) Would you recommend "floating" the boxes, and if so, how? I would love something similar to Latex, where I could just place the box in the text, and Word would move the box up or down on the page as necessary and flow text around it, filling in above or below as necessary. However, I'd also want to be able to reference the box numbers with cross-references. 2) For now, I have set up the boxes as two styles: 1 style for the heading and box title, and another style for the box text - these both have background shading, borders, and different fonts to set the box off from the rest of the text. This seems to work ok except for tables - when I insert a table into the middle of the box text style (which has shading and borders), the box text style stops and the table is left in the middle, without the shading or borders of the surrounding style. How can I rectify this? For example, if I place a photo inline it seems to work fine, but a table does not - is it some sort of magical object? It kinda looks like this ---------------- | box text | | box text | ---------------- -------- |table | -------- ---------------- | box text | | box text | I'd like the table to be inside the box, if that makes sense. 3) What is the official "typographical" name for these things? thanks, karl See: http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/MarginalText.htm  SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP > Hi, > [quoted text clipped - 45 lines] > thanks, > karl The article Stefan referenced offers one way to create these marginal boxes. They are neither true sidebars nor "pull quotes" (though both are similar). I don't know that there is a standard typographical term for them. FWIW, Word 2007 will make it a lot easier to create page elements of this type. SignatureSuzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. > See: http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/MarginalText.htm > [quoted text clipped - 54 lines] > > thanks, > > karl Hi Suzanne and Stefan, Thanks for the reference - in fact I was using that article last night to set up pull quotes in the margin, I didn't think about using it for these text boxes within the flow of the text. Thanks so much - that is a beautiful idea (to use a style to place the text in the margin!) However, I'm still not totally sure on the best way to solve this problem of having a table inside my box. I have done a test and set up a style I called "box". This style creates a frame, that is vertically located at the bottom of the margin and shaded at 5%. However, if I create a few paragraphs to put in this box, then add a table whose width is less than the total margin, then a few more paragraphs afterwards and put the whole thing as style "box", then there are weird white spaces at the side margins of the table and the borders of the frame disappear (just at the table), as in the cheesy ascii diagram I made above. On the other hand, if I place a picture inline in the text, the shading flows around the picture w/o problems. So it seems like there is something special with tables and background shading and borders. It is possible to put ANYTHING to the left or right of a table? Finally, and I think I know the answer to this, if I want to have bullet points or headings or any other styles within the box, I have to create a NEW style, right? I guess this would require nested styles otherwise. You can "wrap" tables in Word 2000 and above, but what this effectively does is insert the table in a frame, so you can't do that if the table is already in a frame; it has to be in the ordinary text layer. SignatureSuzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. > Hi Suzanne and Stefan, > [quoted text clipped - 25 lines] > create a NEW style, right? I guess this would require nested styles > otherwise. Thanks for the reply... but even if I'm not within a frame, having the table "wrap" does not solve the problem - the borders and shading of the surrounding paragraphs are still lost when you get to the table. I also just tried out the frame solution on the larger document and but found more problems. 1) Some of my boxes span multiple pages. And I think frames cannot span multiple pages. Is there any way around this, or is floating objects now out of the question? 2) In addition, the frames ignore the footnotes at the bottom of the page and cover them up, and there doesn't seem to be an option to place the frame just above the footnotes. I think I'll go back to having this as an inline style not within a frame, but it still doesn't solve my table problem. Any ideas on how to get a table to have borders and shading like the paragraphs around it, especially if the table is not as wide as those paragraphs? Or do I have to take a screenshot of the table and reinsert it as an image? Any other work-arounds? One more quick question: Where is the help for MS word located? I found the following on Office Online help: -- You can position, or place, a frame (frame: A container that you can resize and position anywhere on the page. To position text or graphics that contain comments, footnotes, endnotes, or certain fields, you must use a frame instead of a text box.) by dragging it, or you can align it with a reference point, such as a paragraph, page, margin, or newspaper column. A frame pushes the surrounding text aside. The frame is always anchored to the closest paragraph and appears on the same page as the paragraph it's anchored to. Select the frame, right-click, and then click Format Frame. In the Horizontal and Vertical sections, click the options you want. -- I love that. "click the options you want". What if I want to know what the options mean? For example, for vertical placement, what does inside relative to margin mean? Is there a more detailed reference guide provided with Word 2003, or do I have to buy a 3rd party book? thanks for any help you can give! 1. A wrapped table is the only object which can span pages in Word (and it doesn't work in all versions). 2. I have no suggestion for this one. :-( 3. (The table problem) To solve the border problem with tables in frames, you could use a text box, whose borders would enclose all of the text box contents (text paragraphs as well as tables). Alternatively, use a frame but mimic table formatting by using tab stops, but then you would of course have to make sure that text in "cells" are limited to a single line. 4. (Placement options) Inside relative to margin for vertical placement means that the bottom of the frame aligns with the bottom margin (even-numbered pages) or that the top of the frame aligns with the top margin (odd-numbered pages). Similarly for horizontal positions: Horizontal position: Inside relative to margin on right (odd-numbered pages) means the following: |---------| | | | | | | | | | | | | | < Left margin here ----------- Horizontal position: inside relative to margin for left (even-numbered pages) means the following: |---------| | | | | | | | | | | | | | < Right margin here ----------- SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP > Thanks for the reply... but even if I'm not within a frame, having the > table "wrap" does not solve the problem - the borders and shading of [quoted text clipped - 41 lines] > > thanks for any help you can give! Ok, thanks Stefan. The text box solution does work - but if I convert the text box to a frame the problem re-appears. So it really has to do with some fundamental magic about tables that allows them to behave as I want inside of a text box but not inside a frame. Ug. In any case, because of the problem of the frames overlapping my footnotes, I've decided to simply to have my boxes inline and make the table always as wide as the box; it ain't that pretty but it's the best solution I've found. It looks like someone else ran into this a while ago: http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs/browse_ thread/thread/fc954d4ebaa0712e/f172fde9495d6423?lnk=st&q=tables+in+a+frame&rnum= 3#f172fde9495d6423 Thanks for the description of the frame placement options. Too bad Word there isn't documentation that comes with Word 2003 that explains this stuff, or am I not looking in the right place? thanks, karl > Ok, thanks Stefan. The text box solution does work - but if I > convert [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > as > I want inside of a text box but not inside a frame. Ug. I believe the problem with frames is that they don't really have any borders: "frame borders" are actually applied to the *text* in the frame, and inserting a table messes that up. So this can't be fixed (unless you can use text boxes, instead). > In any case, because of the problem of the frames overlapping my > footnotes, I've decided to simply to have my boxes inline and make > the > table always as wide as the box; it ain't that pretty but it's the > best > solution I've found. I'm glad you did find a workable solution (even if it isn't ideal). > It looks like someone else ran into this a while ago: http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs/browse_ thread/thread/fc954d4ebaa0712e/f172fde9495d6423?lnk=st&q=tables+in+a+frame&rnum= 3#f172fde9495d6423 > Thanks for the description of the frame placement options. Too bad > Word there isn't documentation that comes with Word 2003 that > explains > this stuff, or am I not looking in the right place? Clearly, Word 2003 context help could be better (hopefully it will be improved in the next version). SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP What you describe in your text is usually handled with textboxes or frames; but the example in your link is simply a table. > Hi, > [quoted text clipped - 45 lines] > thanks, > karl
|
Reply to this Message |
 Sign In
 Join
 My Latest Posts My Monitored Threads My Blog My Photo Gallery My Profile My Homepage Start New Thread Enable EMail Alerts Rate this Thread
|
©2008 Advenet LLC Privacy Policy - Terms of Use
This website includes both content owned or controlled by Advenet as well as content owned or controlled by third parties.