Margins warning when printing

[Scott Meyers]

I've specified a custom page size for my document that is smaller that the US
Letter paper I actually have in my printer. Each time I print the document, I
get the warning, "The margins of section 1 are outside the printable area of the
page." The document actually prints fine on US Letter paper, though I'd prefer
it to be vertically centered on the page. (It's already centered horizontally.)

Googling for this issue has failed to yield a fix, including these two MS KB
articles:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q291336/
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/224061/

I get the same warning when I print to PDF instead of printing to a real printer.

I'm using Word 2002. Does anybody know how to make this warning go away?

Thanks,

Scott

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

You can center it vertically via the File>Page Setup>Layout menu item.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Scott Meyers]

You can center it vertically via the File>Page Setup>Layout menu item.

This does not appear to have any effect. The page image continues to come out
near the top of my US Letter paper.

Scott

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

If you are printing to letter size paper, why are you specifying a different
size? The vertical alignment is probably be set according to your specified
paper size, not the actual paper size.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Scott Meyers]

If you are printing to letter size paper, why are you specifying a different
size?

I'm writing a book, and its paper size will be smaller than US Letter, but US
Letter paper is all I have for my printer.

Scott

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

I think you should be leaving the paper size as letter size and set margins
as appropriate to achieve the desired print area on the page.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[aalaan]

I'm writing a book, and its paper size will be smaller than US Letter, but US
Letter paper is all I have for my printer.

Scott

Scott, unless you are self-publishing, the size of the book pages is not
important at the creation stage; the publisher's designer will determine
that. If you are sending the book to a publisher you will need to type
in a clear largish (say 12 point) typeface, with double line spacing and
pretty wide margins, A4 size paper (at least it's A4 in Aust. Suzanne
will confirm the US size). The acquistions editor expects your
manuscript in that form (hardcopy and computer file), and that is how
the editor will work with it. After that, the designer copes with the
transition to the finished page size (which is rarely A4). You first
time you'll become aware of the finished page size is probably when (if)
you get pages to proofread.

 

[aalaan]

(e-mail address removed) wrote:

.... as I should have proofread that, *before* sending! <G>

 

[Scott Meyers]

Scott, unless you are self-publishing, the size of the book pages is not
important at the creation stage; the publisher's designer will determine
that.

For my previous books, I've prepared camera-ready copy for the publisher, but in
this case, I'm not doing that, so my motivation for correct pages size is
different. I've found it most convenient to write using the print layout view,
and in that case, Word's window size corresponds to the paper size, not the text
area, so using a large paper size for book-sized margins (which is what I use,
because I want to see more or less what it's going to look like when published,
and that's also helpful for keeping the lines short enough to be easily
readable) leads to wasted space in the editing window.

Anyway, my fundamental question is why Word complains about my putting something
outside the paper's print area when that's true for neither the paper size I've
specified nor the physical paper in the printer.

Scott

 

[aalaan]

For my previous books, I've prepared camera-ready copy for the publisher...

Sorry Scott. I made the faulty assumption that were purely a writer, in
which case my post holds. You are obviously much more directly involved
with the publishing process if you supply camera-ready copy. My
instinct is that for that Word may not be the best platform. There are
some very good publishing packages out there, designed specically for
the technical process of publication. You can import Word documents
into them, and they concenmtrate on such things as image placement, text
flow, margins, running heads and foots and pagination, many of which
Word can do, but not as well I think. When I was briefly involved at
that level, I used Adobe Pagemaker, but that was years ago. It may or
may not have a good reputation now. No doubt others who have it will
comment.

 

[Scott Meyers]

Sorry Scott. I made the faulty assumption that were purely a writer, in

Thanks for taking the time to post. I'm new to Word (hence my use of this
newsgroup), and I'm grateful to anybody who takes the time to try to help us
newbies.

Anyway, on reflection, I think I may try changing the page size back to US
Letter, setting the margins the way I want them, then doing most of my editing
in web mode. That should make the printing warning go away, and it should let
me edit using a relatively narrow window, too.

Scott

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Print Layout with the window zoomed to your liking would probably be more
appropriate.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[POP]

Thanks for taking the time to post. I'm new to Word (hence
my use of this newsgroup), and I'm grateful to anybody who
takes the time to try to help us newbies.

Anyway, on reflection, I think I may try changing the page
size back to US Letter, setting the margins the way I want
them, then doing most of my editing in web mode. That
should make the printing warning go away, and it should let
me edit using a relatively narrow window, too.
Scott

The message is generated based on what you have set for paper
size and margins, plus what it -thinks- your printer is capable
of. There might be a disjoint there; either you printer is
reporting different magins than it cna handle, or, printer
drivers may need updating.
Anyway, that's usually the cause of such a message. FWIW.
Depending on how badly the margins have been violated, it may
print just fine; try it and see.

Pop
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