remove all section breaks quickly?

[Guest]

I copied an Adobe document into Word and now the section breaks are all over
the place leaving me with very ragged and rambling text. I can delete the
section breaks one at a time but there are thousands. Can I delete them all
(without deleting the text - done that already!), or align the text? Thanks.

 

[Robert M. Franz (RMF)]

Hi team

I copied an Adobe document into Word and now the section breaks are all over
the place leaving me with very ragged and rambling text. I can delete the
section breaks one at a time but there are thousands. Can I delete them all
(without deleting the text - done that already!), or align the text? Thanks.

See:

Cleaning up text pasted from the Web (by Suzanne S. Barnhill and Dave Rado)
http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/Formatting/CleanWebText.htm

Greetinx
Robert

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

If they're really section breaks, search for ^b and replace with nothing.

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

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

I copied an Adobe document into Word and now the section breaks are all over
the place leaving me with very ragged and rambling text. I can delete the
section breaks one at a time but there are thousands. Can I delete them all
(without deleting the text - done that already!), or align the text?

Thanks.

 

[DragonWing]

I have a very large merge document, when I do the merge I have section breaks
- new page. I want to remove all of them. When I do a find ^b and replace
with nothing on an individual basis it works, when I try a Replace All I get
0 replacements. Any idea what the problem is? The document is over 500
pages long and there are Section Breaks (new page) every 7 pages. I would
hat eto have to click thru each one individually!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I can't imagine why this doesn't work.

 

[grammatim]

Are the section breaks visible -- you have Show Non-printing
Characters turned on? (It won't find Xrefs if their field codes aren't
showing, so maybe this is the same.)

 

[Parsons]

I was able to clear section breaks, but not column breaks. I tried selecting
all my text (87 pages) and reformatting for one column, but that didn't work.
Any suggestions?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

To search for column breaks, use ^n. You can find a list of the special
characters you can search for by clicking the More button in the Find dialog
and then choosing Special.

 

[tinkeysmom]

Did you ever figure out how to delete the sections breaks? I have a document
and cannot find them even when I do a search for them with the ^b. I have
recently upgraded to 2007 and I can't figure out how to remove this section
break! It's driving me crazy!! Kim

 

[Stefan Blom]

Are you sure there are section breaks in the document? What displays if you
show nonprinting marks? Note that you may find it easier to work with the
breaks in Draft view.

 

[Travlr1974]

I can't remove section breaks either, it's driving me mad!!! All the help I
can find on any forum says to switch to Draft View, select the section break
and delete it. But I can't select the section break! It's a black line, the
mouse becomes a double line with an arrow pointing up and another pointing
down. It can't be deleted. If I delete the space before it the paragraphs
merge, tapping enter creates a new section break!

I can't believe how un-userfriendly Office 2007 is, I was a pro of 2003 and
I feel stupid when using 2007: everything is hidden, complex and follows a
totally absurd logic... Has this version been user-tested for acceptance at
all??!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

That doesn't sound to me like a section break. When I view a section break
in Draft view in Word 2007, it looks just as it did in Word 2003:

=================Section Break (Next Page)==================

What you are describing sounds like a border; see
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/CantGetRidOfLine.htm

 

[Stefan Blom]

See if http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/WhiteSpace.htm applies.

 

[Stefan Blom]

Of course, "white space" is relevant for Print Layout view only.

A paragraph border, as Suzanne suggested, possibly together with "Page break
before" formatting, seems more likely to be the problem.

 

[CDani]

I also am having trouble deleting the "hidden" section breaks. One row in a
table is section one, the very next row magically becomes section 2. I always
have "display all formatting marks" on, and certainlly know what a section
break looks like. The tables have no visible borders. But the border
between section 1 row and section 2 row has a slightly darker and heavier
dotted line. I have found the only way to get rid of the mystery section
breaks (which do not come up on "find"), is to do a column break before and
after the offending row, delete the row and retype. Not something I am
enjoying in this 23 page document.

 

[Stefan Blom]

I can confirm that section breaks inserted into table cells may not be
"seen" by Word when performing a Find & Replace in Print Layout view. In
Draft view, I can find the break but I cannot delete it by replacing with
nothing. Instead, a manual deletion is required. This definitely seems like
a bug.

 

[mcarpeneto]

I too can confirm that in Word 2002 SP3 I cannot use Find and Replace to
delete Section Breaks in a table. I can find 'em, but I can't replace 'em
automatically. I just finished manually deleting 85 Section Breaks. I hope
Microsoft, or someone, creates a fix or a workaround for this problem.

BTW, I can automatically replace Section Break (new page) with Section Break
(continuous). I highlight the document and then go to Page
Setup/Layout/Section start, change New Page to Continuous, and then click OK.
Unfortunately, Delete Section Break is not an option.

 

[Stefan Blom]

There are no workarounds or fixes available (yet), as far as I know. :-(

 

[Greg Maxey]

I think to delete them you first have to find them and then manipulate
the found range a bit, split the table, manipulate the found range a
bit more, then rejoin the table:

Sub ScratchMacro()
Dim i As Long
Dim oRng As Range
Set oRng = ActiveDocument.Range
With oRng.Find
.Text = Chr(12)
While .Execute
oRng.Select
oRng.MoveEnd wdCharacter, 1
oRng.Collapse wdCollapseStart
With Selection
.MoveRight Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.SplitTable
.MoveLeft Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.MoveRight Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1, Extend:=wdExtend
.Delete Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.Delete Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
End With
oRng.Collapse Direction:=wdCollapseEnd
Wend
End With
End Sub

 

[Stefan Blom]

That seems to be working just fine. Very nice!

--
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP


I think to delete them you first have to find them and then manipulate
the found range a bit, split the table, manipulate the found range a
bit more, then rejoin the table:

Sub ScratchMacro()
Dim i As Long
Dim oRng As Range
Set oRng = ActiveDocument.Range
With oRng.Find
.Text = Chr(12)
While .Execute
oRng.Select
oRng.MoveEnd wdCharacter, 1
oRng.Collapse wdCollapseStart
With Selection
.MoveRight Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.SplitTable
.MoveLeft Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.MoveRight Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1, Extend:=wdExtend
.Delete Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
.Delete Unit:=wdCharacter, Count:=1
End With
oRng.Collapse Direction:=wdCollapseEnd
Wend
End With
End Sub