Character Options: Highlight ??

F

Frank H

I've been sent a document. (.doc, not sure what version originally created
it, but NOT 2007. Date Created Property became the day it was copied last.
So, I'm editing it in 2003 instead of 2007)
Some of the text displays and prints with a highlighted background.
I cannot find how it has been set this way... has anyone encountered this?

With the text selected:
it is NOT a Shading setting applied to "text",
it is NOT any setting in the Format font dialog (on ANY of the tabs,
specifically Text Effects is set to None),
NOR any setting under Format Paragraph (on either tab)
It is NOT a style.
When the Remove all Formatting command is used on it, it is unaffected.
You can apply a Style to it, and the Style works, but the shading remains.
It is NOT any kind of Field Code (besides, I've got the Shade Fields turned
off)

When you select this text, and look at it's entries in the Reveal Formatting
pane you see, in the Font group at the top of the pane:
the normal blue link for Font, with the arial and size setting under it
the normal blue link for Language, with English(U.S.) under it,
and then the weird one:
There is a black underlined category named "Character Options:" and under
this category it says "Highlight" (i.e., the "Character Options" is NOT a
link that can be used to bring up the dialog to edit it, as you can with
Font, Language, etc.)

I've been through Tools - Options and don't see anything that looks like it
could be it.

My best theory so far is that the document may originally have been a
WordPerfect doc, and this formatting is something "sticky" that made it
through the translation, but for which Word does not have a corresponding
command.

I can delete it and retype, but there are a TON of these, and there are 20+
documents.

Been using Word since '84, and haven't encountered this. Any ideas?
 
S

Suzanne S. Barnhill

From your description, it appears to be highlighted. You can set the
Highlighter color to None, select the text, and apply the Highlighter to
remove the highlight. For more, see Word 2003's Help topic "Apply or remove
highlighting."

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

Klaus Linke

Hi Frank,

Highlight has been in there for some versions.
I agree it's a nuisance that it is not found in "Format > Font" where you'd
expect it.

If you have the Formatting toolbar displayed, you'll see the highlight
control (a marker pen with "ab" and a colored line below).
It's also on the Reviewing and on the Extended Formatting toolbars.

You can find/replace it: It's at the bottom of the Format list, and you have
to click it twice (or use Ctrl+H twice) in "Replace with" to replace with
"not highlighted".

Or select the whole document, click the button, select again, click again.

Greetings,
Klaus
 
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Same here!

I've received a document with similar (900+) sections marked with this gray-25% background highlight on the text-- but it's not normal highlighting. The highlight tool does not clear it even though Word shows (while tracking changes) the highlight was removed. I'm stuck, awaiting other expertise. I did figure out its a two-part problem. One is that everything is highlighted with gray and there's something else going on. Even after I clear the gray highlight, I have a text with gray background for some other reason.

The odd thing for me is that the Reveal Formatting shows under "Font", "Shading: Pattern: Clear (Gray-25%)"

I've tried setting the 'text' shading to clear, but nothing changes. What does it mean when Gray-25% is in parenthesis after Clear?
 
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dhcernese said:
I've received a document with similar (900+) sections marked with this gray-25% background highlight on the text-- but it's not normal highlighting. The highlight tool does not clear it even though Word shows (while tracking changes) the highlight was removed. I'm stuck, awaiting other expertise. I did figure out its a two-part problem. One is that everything is highlighted with gray and there's something else going on. Even after I clear the gray highlight, I have a text with gray background for some other reason.

The odd thing for me is that the Reveal Formatting shows under "Font", "Shading: Pattern: Clear (Gray-25%)"

I've tried setting the 'text' shading to clear, but nothing changes. What does it mean when Gray-25% is in parenthesis after Clear?
Hah! Through a lot of experimentation, I finally got it fixed! First, you have to clear all the text highlighting. Then you have to fool the shading settings-- which thinks everything is clear but its not really. So you set it to something else, like 5%, and then set it back to clear!

Voila!
 

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