A tough field question

[Guest]

Hi everybody,
I have two versions of a file with fields in it, one typed normally for my
own reference and one that I want to have in manuscript format for a book.
Each chapter is a field.

In the first document, the font is Times New Roman 12, there are blank lines
after page headings, between breaks in a chapter is always the same sequence
of lines: a blank line, long dash (center aligned), and then another blank
line.
In the manuscript document, I want to eliminate any blank lines, replace the
center aligned long dashes with number signs (#), and have the format of
everything be double-spaced, Courier New font.

I know it sounds complicated, sorry!

Anyway, is there a way to specify that format when I update my fields in
that document, so I don't have to change it all every time I update? I'd
really appreciate the help, thanks for reading my long post!

Thanks a lot!
Jezzica85

 

[Jezebel]

Don't maintain two versions of your document. Set up two templates, one with
the 'normal' styles and one with the manuscript styles. Then apply the
template you need, with 'Automatically update document styles' checked.

In your 'normal text' template, define your normal style as Times 12 pt
single space; in your MSS version set it to Courier double-spaced.

Don't use blank lines. Define your chapter separator as a style, set to
have, or not have, extra space before and after. Use a DocProperty field for
the divider text itself (ie dashes or hashes).

Not sure what you're getting at with formats and fields. Fields are a method
for automatically generated or updated content, created using ctrl-F9 or
Insert > Field. In which context, 'Each chapter is a field' is hard to
interpret. Updating fields has nothing to do with document format.

 

[Guest]

Hi Jezebel,
My computer just did something strange and it doesn't look like my previous
post showed up, sorry if this is a double!

Anyway, thanks for the template idea. I don't really know anything about
templates, though, so would you mind giving me a general idea of how to start
one? Also, I'm not sure what you mean about "defining my chapter separator as
a style". Would you please explain?

Also, I thought DocProperty fields were only for info in the "Properties"
box, not for your own text. Would you mind clarifying that too?

And one more thing (last one, I promise! ), is there a way to use the
template to turn text in italics to text that's underlined, once the template
is applied?

Thanks so much!
Jezzica85

 

[Guest]

I forgot to mention one thing before--what I meant by "chapters are fields"
is that each chapter is in an INCLUDETEXT field, because I keep them separate
for easy formatting, then put them together.

 

[Jezebel]

See http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting.htm for some gentle tutorials on
styles and templates. It's worth investing a little time in this: it will
save you a HEAP of time in the future. In brief, each paragraph in your
document has a defined style. The style for the current paragraph is shown
in the Formatting toolbar. If you've never (knowingly) used one, all your
paragraphs are formatted using the 'normal' style. Other built-in styles are
'heading 1', 'bullet', etc. You can define your own. Each style is a
predefined collection of font, paragraph and other settings such as you are
currently applying manually.

You could define a style called 'chapter divider': center-aligned, 24 point
space above and below.

A template is primarily a set of style definitions. You can apply a template
to an existing document using Tools > Templates and add-ins. Optionally,
this updates all the styles in the document to match the definitions in the
template.

DocProperty fields can be used not only for built-in properties, but also
for any custom properties you define on the File > Properties > Custom tab.

You could use a template to switch between italic and underlining if you
defined a character style (as distinct from a paragraph style), and applied
that style to the emphasised text. You can also use Find and Replace to look
for, and apply, formatting. Click 'More' on the Find and Replace dialog.