Bullet blues

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Karitaat - 01 Nov 2006 16:37 GMT

Hi all,

Word 2002 SP3

OK... I thought I had Bullets and Numbering tamed.
How presumptious!

I use the Shauna Kelly's set up to format a BulletedList
see: http://www.shaunakelly.com/word/bullets/controlbullets.html
I call this list: wlBullets (it is the 3rd non-empty ListTemplate)

I use the same technique to set up a NumberedList
I call that list: wlNumbers (it is the 1st non-empty ListTemplate)

I perform my tricks in Report.dot, that also contains some Fields etc.
I always have my Tools > Options... [View] Field shading: When
Selected.

All of a sudden, either in my Template or in the document that is based
on that template, I see that all Fields are grey (Sure enough: Field
shading: Always)
That is a symptome of List trouble.

Let me make it clear:
I did NOT change the Field shading and then the trouble begins.
No: the Word bug changes the Field shading as a sign that trouble has
struck.

And indeed: if I go to Format | Bullets and Numbering something is
wrong with my ListTemplates.
Sometimes the linked styles have vanished; sometimes the list is called
wlBullets2; sometimes the the Numbered ListTemplate is called
wlBullets, or maybe the name is gone.
Yes: the bug is quite resourceful.

But it drives me crazy.
I have [Reset] and [Customize...] wlBullets and wlNumbers more than I
care to remember.

You are interested in my setup? No problem: I know it by heart :-(

Both Bullets and Numbers have 3 non-empty levels
Their styles looks very much the same.
Bullet1 is a bullet; Bullet2 is en dash; Bullet3 a square bullet
Number1 is "1."; Number2 is "1.a"; Number3 is "i)"

The levels 1 through 5 are linked to style: 'List Bullet n' or 'List
Number n'.
The levels 6 through 9 are linked to style: (none)

Level 1: Bullet/Nr position: 18 pt
Tab space: 18 pt Indent at: 36 pt
Level 2: Bullet/Nr position: 18 pt
Tab space: 18 pt Indent at: 36 pt
(yes: that is the same; by design)
Level 3: Bullet/Nr position: 36 pt
Tab space: 18 pt Indent at: 54 pt

Level 4 up: Bullet/Nr position: 54 pt
Tab space: 0 pt Indent at: 54 pt
Follow number with: nothing

Any thoughts, laughs, condolences are appreciated.

regards,
peter

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John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh] - 08 Nov 2006 09:21 GMT

Hi Peter:

Make sure you have "Keep track of formatting" turned OFF in Tools>Options...

If that's on, it will wreck your list numbering every time.

Now: The discussion of Fields has me puzzled :-) If you're using Shauna's
numbering, you don't HAVE any fields, and the setting of Field Shading
doesn't apply.

If you DO have fields, who done that?? How could your list-based numbering
have become replaced by field-based numbering?

I think what you may be seeing is a new feature of Word 2003. If you click
right ahead of the first character in a numbered paragraph, the entire list
should go grey. This was a new feature designed to highlight easily for the
user which paragraphs were members of the list and which ones were not.

Hope this helps

On 2/11/06 2:37 AM, in article
1162395465.443385.24620@k70g2000cwa.googlegroups.com, "Karitaat"
<karitaat@hotmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
[quoted text clipped - 62 lines]
> regards,
> peter

Signature

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <john@mcghie.name>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

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Karitaat - 09 Nov 2006 11:58 GMT

Hi John,

thank you for your reply.

I use Word-XP.

To answer your question ref. Fields:

My Numbering has nothing to do with my Fields: my template contains
Header/Footers with fields for the Title of the document, the date,
PgNr, etc.
Two separate things... I think
However, I have learned that in software: if you flush the toilet here,
somewhere else the light will go out.

But I know what went wrong:
* I maintain a template
* That template is quite old
(it started out as a Word 6 dot, converted to Word97 and to WordXP)
* In that template I applied Shauna Kelly's 'cookbook'
* I have done that a couple of times, near the End point of the dot
=> this is begging for corruption

So what I eventually did (and *should* have done in the first place):
* in an empty, virgin (!!!) document
* record the steps of the 'cookbook' in a Macro
Ah, look: every time I Customize a ListTemplate, Word gives a
Selection.Range.ListFormat.ApplyListTemplate command

* enhance the macro
(just the steps, NO .ApplyListTemplate )
* throw away the empty, not so virgin anymore, document
* and apply the macro to my template.

It seems to be well tempered, now.

John, (plus anybody else maybe?)
I have a couple of questions
1) my document-template has 120 ListTemplates
I know I cannot delete them, and in your article
'Word's numbering explained' you state that Word will crash
if the number of list templates in a single list gallery
exceeds 256.
Q: 'in a single List Gallery'? or 'in a single Document' ?
How can I find out the number of ListTemplates in a Gallery?
Q: I think I have read somewhere that WordXP starts anew if the number
of ListTemplates exceeds 256. Can you confirm that?

2) I plan to modify the Bullets/Numbering button (on the standard
toolbar) so it will apply 'my' styles 'List Bullet n' or
'List Number n'
I am extremely paranoia about useing the right ListTemplate
My (customized) LT's are called: wlBullets and wlNumbers
Q: Can I be sure that ALL 'List Bullet n' styles are 'my' styles, if:
ActiveDocument.ListTemplates("wlBullets") _
.ListLevels(1).LinkedStyle = "List Bullet" ??

regards,
peter

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh] schreef:

> Hi Peter:
>
[quoted text clipped - 96 lines]
> Technical Writer.
> Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

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