kerning

[Guest]

why when I apply kerning to text that I selected does it continue to be
applied to text that I type on the next line (new paragraph). I have to go
in and turn it off. I thought it applied only to selected text.
Thanks

 

[Jay Freedman]

Kerning is like all other font and paragraph attributes: When you set the
attributes and begin to type, they remain in effect until you turn them off.
You'll see the same behavior with bold, italic, double-spacing, etc.

If you know you're going to want the kerning to be turned off in the next
paragraph, you could first press Enter to create the paragraph mark that
separates them. Then go back, select the text, and apply kerning. Finally,
move the cursor to the next (but already existing) paragraph, and it won't
be kerned.

A better method is to create a character style that's defined as Default
Paragraph Font + Kern at 8 pt (or whatever), and assign a keyboard shortcut
or toolbar button to that style. When you want to apply kerning, select the
text and apply the character style. At the end of the kerned text, press
Alt+spacebar to return to the underlying paragraph style, and then continue
typing.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Guest]

Jay, Thank you. You have given me some great suggestions. A couple of
questions.
1. Alt+spacebar opens the Restore, minimize, close shortcut menu. Is there
another keyboard shortcut I should be using.
2. Once I have created my character style, how do I assign it to a toolbar
or keyboard shortcut?

 

[Jay Freedman]

Jay, Thank you. You have given me some great suggestions. A couple
of questions.
1. Alt+spacebar opens the Restore, minimize, close shortcut menu. Is
there another keyboard shortcut I should be using.

Oops. Sorry, that should be Ctrl+spacebar.

2. Once I have created my character style, how do I assign it to a
toolbar or keyboard shortcut?

While you're still creating the style, in the New Style dialog you can click
the Format button at the bottom left and select "Shortcut key" from the
list. Or, after the style already exists, you can select the style and click
Modify, and then use the Format button in the same way.

Alternatively, you can open the Tools > Customize dialog and click the
Keyboard button. Select "Styles" in the Category list, then select your
style in the Commands list.

In either case, you can then put the cursor in the "Press new shortcut key"
box and type the shortcut you want; then click the Assign button. This is
described in detail (for a macro rather than a style, but the idea is the
same) at
http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/Customization/AsgnCmdOrMacroToHotkey.htm.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Guest]

Thank you again. One more question does Word have a tracking feature for
typesetting in addition to a kerning feature? I dont see it in the
documentation. Thanks a lot!

 

[Jay Freedman]

In Word, tracking is referred to as "spacing" in the Character Spacing
tab of the Format > Font dialog. You can apply tracking to any
selected text, as little as one character and as much as the whole
document.

You get more control of tracking than of kerning. The tracking can be
specified in any increment of 0.1 pt. Kerning is determined by the
character pairs table in the font itself (if there is one), and you
can only set the size threshold above which kerning is used, or turn
it off completely.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup so all may benefit.

 

[Robert M. Franz (RMF)]

Hi Vicky

why when I apply kerning to text that I selected does it continue to be
applied to text that I type on the next line (new paragraph). I have to go
in and turn it off.

FWIW, I don't see any good reason to _not_ kern (at least for all text
above a given size, say, 5 pt). It increases legibility, and there's no
excuse not to do that (as long as you don't use PowerPoint .-)).

Greetinx
Robert