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MS Office Forum / Word / Numbering / July 2009Word 2007: Manual restarts of numbered paragraphs - good, bad or u
Are there any limitations in terms of document stability on the number of manual restarts you can have in a document created in Word 2007? I ask this in relation to documents that have clauses where there are several alternatives/options for each clause or set of clauses. These optional clauses are either deleted to leave only the required clause, or can be copied and pasted into other documents. Automatic outline or multi-level numbering is used in all cases. For example [My comments/actions are in square brackets]: ******** Option A (To be used if the document is being used in the US) 1.1 Text [automatic numbering] 1.2 Text [automatic numbering] 1.3 Text [automatic numbering] Option B (To be used if the document is being used in the UK) 1.1 Alternative text [automatic numbering - manually restart paragraph at 1.1] 1.2 Alternative text [automatic numbering] 1.3 Alternative text [automatic numbering] or 1.3 Alternative Text [automatic numbering - manually restart paragraph at 1.3] ******** It is not uncommon to have 50 or more restarts in a document. And the restarts are not always on "1", but usually on other clause numbers, e.g. "2" or "3.1". My experience has been that in previous versions of Word (2000 + 2003) manual restarts led to instability and document corruption. I don't know how well they work in Word 2007. Please could I have your expert advice/experience on manual restarts in Word 2007 - good or bad practice? Any safe workarounds? (e.g. manually-typing in the paragraph numbers). And is there a threshold number (e.g. 10? 20? 50?) for the point at which manual restarts start causing document corruption? Many thanks! In a situation such as this, I would be inclined to number the paragraphs manually rather than attempt to use auto numbering at all. That's the situation I'm in with some of the documents I create that are updates to books that contain many numbered questions (practice exams). When it's necessary to add or substitute new questions, I use manual numbering for the questions themselves, and autonumbering (A, B, C, D) only for the multiple-choice answers.  SignatureSuzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org > Are there any limitations in terms of document stability on the number of > manual restarts you can have in a document created in Word 2007? [quoted text clipped - 50 lines] > > Many thanks! Dear Suzanne, Many thanks for replying so quickly. It's good to know what the experts do in such an instance. Although I was hoping for some miracle in Word 2007 where restarts are concerned ... . Many thanks! *********** > In a situation such as this, I would be inclined to number the paragraphs > manually rather than attempt to use auto numbering at all. That's the [quoted text clipped - 58 lines] > > > > Many thanks! Many I'm being overly cautious, but I get nervous about a lot of restarts. I do use them in some documents, and they seem to work okay as long as no one else edits the document, but I always worry. SignatureSuzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org > Dear Suzanne, > [quoted text clipped - 78 lines] >> > >> > Many thanks! A different approach is to actually make use of restarts and then, when editing is complete, convert numbering to text using the following line of code: ActiveDocument.ConvertNumbersToText (which can be run in the Immediate window of the Visual Basic Editor: Alt+F11, Ctrl+G, type the command, press Enter). Of course, as you said, in really complex documents it might be just as easy to type numbers in manually from the beginning. SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP > Many I'm being overly cautious, but I get nervous about a lot of restarts. > I do use them in some documents, and they seem to work okay as long as no [quoted text clipped - 85 lines] >>> > >>> > Many thanks! I'm reasonably comfortable with restarting numbering at 1, but I refuse to restart numbering (aside from SEQ fields) at a given starting number, which is what is required in the instances I mentioned. SignatureSuzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA http://word.mvps.org >A different approach is to actually make use of restarts and then, when >editing is complete, convert numbering to text using the following line of [quoted text clipped - 102 lines] >>>> > >>>> > Many thanks! Dear Stefan and Suzanne, These are all extremely helpful answers as it's very useful to have an external expert's opinion, especially if it's based on personal (often painful!) experience. Unfortunately the documents will be worked on by a number of people as they are templates and so used as the basis of other documents, so maybe I have no choice but to go with the manually-typed paragraph numbers route rather than have to tidy up corrupt numbering. I am not familiar with the use of SEQ fields or VBA in Word docs, but I have tecchie colleagues who are so will get them to explain why these are more robust. However, to compound the issue, we are currently having to save down to .doc format to accommodate those of our users who have not migrated to 2007 yet. My experience of manual restarts (not on 1) in .doc has not been positive so far. I was hoping docx would prove more robust. Thank you for your suggestions. Rona > I'm reasonably comfortable with restarting numbering at 1, but I refuse to > restart numbering (aside from SEQ fields) at a given starting number, which [quoted text clipped - 106 lines] > >>>> > > >>>> > Many thanks! RonaM: I also have documents that are used by other users that include numbered paragraphs, some of which the user must choose a paragraph for their own country, i.e. deleting the paragraph(s) that are irrelevent to their situation. Instead of manually restarting the numbering, I leave the numbering automatic and have clear highlighted text stating the need to choose the applicable paragaph. As the user only does a delete, the numbering looks after itself. I found this as a low risk option due to possible low-user-ability with Word and numbering specifically. All the best DeanH > Dear Stefan and Suzanne, > [quoted text clipped - 129 lines] > > >>>> > > > >>>> > Many thanks! Hmm, but this only deals with the simplest case: when there is an alternative paragraph for some readers. SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP > RonaM: I also have documents that are used by other users that include > numbered paragraphs, some of which the user must choose a paragraph for [quoted text clipped - 169 lines] >> > >>>> > >> > >>>> > Many thanks! The restarts will still be tricky. SignatureStefan Blom Microsoft Word MVP > Hmm, but this only deals with the simplest case: when there is an > alternative paragraph for some readers. [quoted text clipped - 177 lines] >>> > >>>> > >>> > >>>> > Many thanks! Stefan, obviously so and that is my reading of the OP's original posting. Ciao DeanH > Hmm, but this only deals with the simplest case: when there is an > alternative paragraph for some readers. [quoted text clipped - 172 lines] > >> > >>>> > > >> > >>>> > Many thanks! Hello Dean, Sorry for the delay in replying - I didn't realise that this post had attracted more assistance! Thank you for your suggestion. I think I see what you are getting at: Either 2.1 Used in US [AUTOMATIC] OR 2.2 Used in UK [AUTOMATIC] Unfortunately it is not an either/or in many cases. We might, for example, have up to five alternative 2.2s. Which is when the question arises: do we restart the alternative 2.2s or type in the 2.2s? We can't even use automatic sequential numbering, e.g. 2.1 US only [AUTOMATIC] OR 2.2 UK version 1 [AUTOMATIC] or Alternative clause 2.2 - first option: 2.3 UK version 2 [AUTOMATIC] Alternative clause 2.2 - second option: 2.4 UK version 3 [AUTOMATIC] Alternative clause 2.2 - third option: 2.5 UK version 4 [AUTOMATIC] etc. because the automatic 2.3 ... 2.4 ... 2.5 do not reflect the correct paragraph numbering, i.e. they should all be 2.2. Hope this helps explain my dilemma! But what I'm concerned about is: how stable are automatic restarts - would too many "corrupt" a document? Regards, Rona > Stefan, obviously so and that is my reading of the OP's original posting. > Ciao [quoted text clipped - 176 lines] > > >> > >>>> > > > >> > >>>> > Many thanks! RonaM: you are right, this really has got some attention ;-) As far as I am concerned, it does not matter how many alternatives/options you have, if the user is to chosse only one - then the numbering will correct itself - that is its job ;-) I often have three or four options (depending on country) and the user deletes the unwanted countries leaving only one. I would not manually number any of the clauses, this will only lead to misnumbering in the future. If you have five 2.2's and only one must be used and the other four deleted, autonumber without restarts. In the "master" document you WILL have 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5 and 2.6 but once the document have been edited (ie the four superfluous clauses deleted) all numbering will be correct. In my opinion the temporary incorrect numbering is acceptable because I know it will come out good in the end. My opinion of the acceptable number of restarts in any one document - as has been commented on before (Ms Barnhill I believe) I only do restarts at level 1 and only very infrequently at any other level. Also, even then I would only have one or two restarts in any one document. How Word deals with many upon many restarts is anyone's guess and I am sure it will be fine until that one day when the boss is calling for the document urgently and it just wont open! And only the day before you cleaned up you hard-drive and all the copies have been deleted! If in doubt - don't :-) My advice - don't restart, let Word auto-numbering do its job, teach the users instead. All the best DeanH > Hello Dean, > [quoted text clipped - 224 lines] > > > >> > >>>> > > > > >> > >>>> > Many thanks! |
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