How to format a document comprising text pasted from other documen

[Guest]

Hi there

I have two largish Word 2003 documents - approximately 90 and 60 pages of
text and tables - which I would eventually like to make into one. Each
document was written by a number of authors from other organisations using (I
presume) different programs. We then copied the various sections into the
two larger documents. Both documents now have various formatting problems
where, for example, making a small edit may result in several pages changing
font size and becoming italicised, or page numbering is lost, or some other
time-consuming problem occurs. There does not appear to be any rhyme or
reason to this.

Is there any way to now rid the document of the various formats without
losing tables, headings, etc? Also, given that the end document will be
around 150 pages long, would it be better to divide the document up into eg.
linked chapters and appendices so that the smaller documents are easier to
work with?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

Andrew

 

[Guest]

Hello Andrew,

When you have many documents that have come from unknown sources your best
bet would be to highlight each document entirely (Ctrl +A) and then copy it
(Ctrl +C) and then open Word Pad and paste it there. This will strip out all
the coding and gobbledygook that could be lurking in your document. You can
then copy it and go to Word and click on Edit and Paste Special and select
unformatted text. This will take away your formatting, but it's much easier
to set up your formatting one time rather than every time you make a change
to your document. You shouldn't have any problem with a large document in
word. I hope this has been helpful to you.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Well, to begin with, 150 pages is not much for Word to handle, even with
tables and graphics. My usual approach to a problem such as yours is to
start more or less from scratch. Print a copy of the document as is (or the
two contributing documents before they are combined) so that you can tell
which paragraphs are headings and what the original layout was. Then strip
out all the direct formatting and apply the style that will be used for the
majority of the text (Body Text, say, or Body Text First Indent). Then go
through and apply heading and other styles as needed (the Styles and
Formatting task pane makes this a lot easier than it was with the Styles
dropdown alone). When editing is complete, worry about placement of wrapped
graphics and the like. This approach will allow you to, for example, apply
your custom outline-numbering formats systematically.

Do note that in a case like this smaller documents are never easier to work
with--too much trouble to keep pagination continuous, generate TOC, index,
etc.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

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[Guest]

Thanks for the responses. I suspected that I might have to take this
approach, but was hoping to avoid it. Groan...

Andrew