Is it possible to do Subject? I can select the table. However, copying
them into a MS table of the same no. rows and cols does not work. It all
goes into one cell.

It is not, as far as I know, in a known format (html?), but its columns
are lined up quite well. For example,

96 3368 Leo
97 3587 UMa
....
103 581 Cas

In some cases after say Cas, there may be a brief description. The
description is not needed though.

Instead of trying to paste it into a table, just paste it AS a table and
then do whatever is required to straighten it out and make it fit your
requirements. Online tables do often have nested cells, however, and can be
quite frustrating to work with; make sure you have table gridlines
displayed!

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"W. eWatson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:i5ba5p$mcs$(E-Mail Removed)...
> Is it possible to do Subject? I can select the table. However, copying
> them into a MS table of the same no. rows and cols does not work. It all
> goes into one cell.
>
> It is not, as far as I know, in a known format (html?), but its columns
> are lined up quite well. For example,
>
> 96 3368 Leo
> 97 3587 UMa
> ...
> 103 581 Cas
>
> In some cases after say Cas, there may be a brief description. The
> description is not needed though.
>

On 8/28/2010 10:22 AM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
> Instead of trying to paste it into a table, just paste it AS a table and
> then do whatever is required to straighten it out and make it fit your
> requirements. Online tables do often have nested cells, however, and can
> be quite frustrating to work with; make sure you have table gridlines
> displayed!
>
Word 2007 BTW.

How do I paste AS table? I first pasted into a Notepad txt file to see
what I would get. It was nice and orderly, but certainly not in a Word
table.

I then pasted into a new Word docx, and it looks like the txt. I noticed
the little icon in the lower corner, but there was no option to make the
text into a table.

For heaven's sake don't paste into Notepad, as this will definitely convert
it to plain text and remove any tabular format. If it's a table in HTML, it
will paste into Word as a table unless you have selected the option to paste
as plain text. If the tabular format is achieved with tabs, you can use
Convert Text to Table (separating at tabs) to make it into a table. If the
text is aligned with spaces, it will be much more difficult. Display
nonprinting characters so you can see what you're dealing with.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"W. eWatson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:i5cb0l$9u7$(E-Mail Removed)...
> On 8/28/2010 10:22 AM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
>> Instead of trying to paste it into a table, just paste it AS a table and
>> then do whatever is required to straighten it out and make it fit your
>> requirements. Online tables do often have nested cells, however, and can
>> be quite frustrating to work with; make sure you have table gridlines
>> displayed!
>>
> Word 2007 BTW.
>
> How do I paste AS table? I first pasted into a Notepad txt file to see
> what I would get. It was nice and orderly, but certainly not in a Word
> table.
>
> I then pasted into a new Word docx, and it looks like the txt. I noticed
> the little icon in the lower corner, but there was no option to make the
> text into a table.
>

On 8/28/2010 9:20 PM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
> For heaven's sake don't paste into Notepad, as this will definitely
> convert it to plain text and remove any tabular format. If it's a table
> in HTML, it will paste into Word as a table unless you have selected the
> option to paste as plain text. If the tabular format is achieved with
> tabs, you can use Convert Text to Table (separating at tabs) to make it
> into a table. If the text is aligned with spaces, it will be much more
> difficult. Display nonprinting characters so you can see what you're
> dealing with.
>
My point about putting the "table" into a txt file was to see if it
maintained columns. It did, and the table must be constructed using
spaces, but nothing else. So it really isn't formated, but just like
someone would do by using Notepad.

In any case, see
<http://astronomyonline.org/Astrophotography/MessierTable.asp>

Note the table two dozen or so lines down. I tried copy and paste the
first three lines into Word 2007, but got no table.

I think I'll just need to be satisfied with the txt format, which is OK.
I was just interested in how one might copy some web page formatted
table into a Word table. Apparently, not so easy.

If you *were* dealing with spaces, you could replace the spaces with tabs
and then convert the text to a table, separating at tabs. As it happens,
however, this is not necessary. If I copy the table (which *is* a table)
from the Web page you cite and paste it into Word, it pastes as a table.
That it is an ordinary table can be seen from the fact that, if I select the
first row and make it a heading row, it does repeat on every page.

That said, the table does not observe Word's table defaults because it is
set up as an HTML-style table. It doesn't have borders, but it does have
space between cells. I wondered if it might have some nesting, but I'm not
sure it does. If you look at the table options and change the space between
cells to 0" (or just clear that check box) and the left and right cell
margins to 0.08", it will look a little more normal but still just a bit
odd.

I was able to make it look just like an ordinary Word table by converting
table to text (separating with tabs) and then back to a table (separating at
tabs).

When you paste it into Notepad, it is definitely going to lose its table
formatting because Notepad does not support tables; if you then paste it
into Word, then of course you will not have a tabular structure. If you
paste it directly from the Web page into Word, it *will be* a table and can
be handled accordingly.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"W. eWatson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:i5fci9$oj$(E-Mail Removed)...
> On 8/28/2010 9:20 PM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
>> For heaven's sake don't paste into Notepad, as this will definitely
>> convert it to plain text and remove any tabular format. If it's a table
>> in HTML, it will paste into Word as a table unless you have selected the
>> option to paste as plain text. If the tabular format is achieved with
>> tabs, you can use Convert Text to Table (separating at tabs) to make it
>> into a table. If the text is aligned with spaces, it will be much more
>> difficult. Display nonprinting characters so you can see what you're
>> dealing with.
>>
> My point about putting the "table" into a txt file was to see if it
> maintained columns. It did, and the table must be constructed using
> spaces, but nothing else. So it really isn't formated, but just like
> someone would do by using Notepad.
>
> In any case, see
> <http://astronomyonline.org/Astrophotography/MessierTable.asp>
>
> Note the table two dozen or so lines down. I tried copy and paste the
> first three lines into Word 2007, but got no table.
>
> I think I'll just need to be satisfied with the txt format, which is OK. I
> was just interested in how one might copy some web page formatted table
> into a Word table. Apparently, not so easy.

On 8/30/2010 5:39 AM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
> If you *were* dealing with spaces, you could replace the spaces with
> tabs and then convert the text to a table, separating at tabs. As it
> happens, however, this is not necessary. If I copy the table (which *is*
> a table) from the Web page you cite and paste it into Word, it pastes as
> a table. That it is an ordinary table can be seen from the fact that, if
> I select the first row and make it a heading row, it does repeat on
> every page.
>
> That said, the table does not observe Word's table defaults because it
> is set up as an HTML-style table. It doesn't have borders, but it does
> have space between cells. I wondered if it might have some nesting, but
> I'm not sure it does. If you look at the table options and change the
> space between cells to 0" (or just clear that check box) and the left
> and right cell margins to 0.08", it will look a little more normal but
> still just a bit odd.
>
> I was able to make it look just like an ordinary Word table by
> converting table to text (separating with tabs) and then back to a table
> (separating at tabs).
>
> When you paste it into Notepad, it is definitely going to lose its table
> formatting because Notepad does not support tables; if you then paste it
> into Word, then of course you will not have a tabular structure. If you
> paste it directly from the Web page into Word, it *will be* a table and
> can be handled accordingly.
>
Good. Thanks.

Insert | Table inserts a new empty table; it doesn't insert text as a table.
If you paste your tab-delimited text into that document, select it, and use
Table | Convert | Text to Table, you should get the result you want.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

"W. eWatson" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:i63tki$8fc$(E-Mail Removed)...
> On 8/30/2010 7:43 PM, W. eWatson wrote:
>> On 8/30/2010 5:39 AM, Suzanne S. Barnhill wrote:
>>> If you *were* dealing with spaces, you could replace the spaces with
>>> tabs and then convert the text to a table, separating at tabs. As it
>>> happens, however, this is not necessary. If I copy the table (which *is*
>>> a table) from the Web page you cite and paste it into Word, it pastes as
>>> a table. That it is an ordinary table can be seen from the fact that, if
>>> I select the first row and make it a heading row, it does repeat on
>>> every page.
>>>
>>> That said, the table does not observe Word's table defaults because it
>>> is set up as an HTML-style table. It doesn't have borders, but it does
>>> have space between cells. I wondered if it might have some nesting, but
>>> I'm not sure it does. If you look at the table options and change the
>>> space between cells to 0" (or just clear that check box) and the left
>>> and right cell margins to 0.08", it will look a little more normal but
>>> still just a bit odd.
>>>
>>> I was able to make it look just like an ordinary Word table by
>>> converting table to text (separating with tabs) and then back to a table
>>> (separating at tabs).
>>>
>>> When you paste it into Notepad, it is definitely going to lose its table
>>> formatting because Notepad does not support tables; if you then paste it
>>> into Word, then of course you will not have a tabular structure. If you
>>> paste it directly from the Web page into Word, it *will be* a table and
>>> can be handled accordingly.
>>>
>> Good. Thanks.
> I just revisited this, and now have a table with tabs separating fields. I
> create a New doc, and select Insert->Table. The choice for text to table
> is greyed out. I did an ordinary Copy of the table from another docx.
> Comments?
>