Replace cross-reference with text

[Paul]

I have cross-references to figures throughout my document. I will be
submitting this to a conference with a page limit, but I have
requested an additional page for figure 4 (say) so that it can be
shown in large scale at the end of the document. To make it easy for
the editors, I have supplied a small scale version of figure 4 in the
body of the text, and a large scale version at the end -- they can
delete the large one if they don't want to grant me the extra page.
However, this means I don't know which figure 4 will be retained, so I
should not be cross-referencing the figure labels of either versions
of figure 4. Therefore, I want to search for all occurences of "Fig.
4" (which are all cross-references to the smaller version of figure 4)
and replace the cross-reference with the *text* "Fig. 4" i.e. not a
cross-reference. When I try to use Word's Search-and-Replace to do
this, it's hard to tell whether anything changed because the visible
text remains unchanged. After do the replacement of all instances
(one at a time), I checked and found that all occurrences of "Fig. 4"
are still cross-references. Is there a way to force the replacement?
I am using Word 2003 on Windows XP.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

The cross-reference will be a REF field; if you display field codes (Alt+F9)
, you'll see something such as { REF _Ref269150370 }. Once you've replaced
the cross-reference with plain text, you will not see this field.

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

 

[Paul]

Hmm, that's strange. I manually searched for, and erased, all cross-
references to Fig. 4. In place of each occurance, I typed in the
letters "Fig. 4". When I did a Print Preview, I got an "Error!
Reference source not found." after each occurance of my manually typed
"Fig. 4". It turns out that there is a zero-width cross-reference
that I did not manage to erase.

I did Alt-F9 to reveal all codes, and indeed, the cross reference was
revealed as { REF_Ref264639379 \h }. It's actually hard to select
that string with the mouse for copying, as the selection often expands
automatically to include the braces. In that case, Word thinks you're
trying to copy the entire field, and pasting into text-only fields
(e.g. Search window, or Notebook) pastes nothing. However, I can use
the cursor keys to select all field-code text other than the braces
and copy/paste that into the Search window.

Thanks, Suzanne.

 

[Paul]

I found a better solution based on your former post
http://groups.google.ca/group/microsoft.public.word.docmanagement/browse_frm/thread/41b94219109e04de.

Search for "^d REF _Ref264639379" without quotes.

Thanks again!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

There's a whole article based on this at
http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/SpecialFind.htm. But the point of my post
was that displaying field codes would allow you to see whether or not you
had actually eliminated them. And when you are searching for field codes in
order to replace them with plain text (instead of editing them), you WANT
the entire field (including braces) to be selected. Alternatively, you might
find that just unlinking the field (Ctrl+Shift+F9) would accomplish what you
want.

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

I found a better solution based on your former post
http://groups.google.ca/group/microsoft.public.word.docmanagement/browse_frm/thread/41b94219109e04de.

Search for "^d REF _Ref264639379" without quotes.

Thanks again!

 

[Paul]

Wow. Thanks yet again for the link. And for making that knowledge
available.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

You're welcome.

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

Wow. Thanks yet again for the link. And for making that knowledge
available.

 

[Paul]

On that note, I'd just like to say that sometimes, I feel that a Ph.D.
should be offered for Microsoft Word. The fact that the knowledge is
proprietarily driven and ephemeral is immaterial, since the same can
be said for high tech. In fact, it can be argued the expertise in
Word seems to have more staying power than some (if not many) areas of
high tech graduate degrees. As well, much of high tech research is
also driven by companies.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Well, I'll accept an honorary doctorate if you want to confer one, though I
don't deserve it as much as some of my colleagues!

I started using Word with Word 2.0 for Windows in 1992, and there are still
vast areas of it that I have no experience of and know little or nothing
about. Much of what I do know, however, I learned from reading questions and
answers in these NGs.

A lot of the problem arises from the fact that, the more Microsoft tries to
make Word easy to use, the more of its basic functionality is actually
concealed from users. A user who builds a crystal radio from scratch will
obviously know more about how it works than one who just turns on the
Philco. And it's not entirely unreasonable for users to want a word
processor that is as simple to use as a radio (or a toaster, the usual
analog), provided all they want to use it for is simple projects. When their
needs become more complex, however, they must accept that more expertise is
required.

The analogy is often made to driving a car. No matter how long you've
watched someone else drive a car, you won't find it that easy to do the
first time you actually try. It requires at least some instruction and a lot
of practice to become very good at it. But, on the analogy of research-based
degrees, no one would expect to get a Ph.D. in, say, history by reading one
book about the Civil War. It does require a lot of application and study,
but you might get a Ph.D. in history based on being an expert on the Civil
War without knowing a great deal about ancient history. Similarly, you can
have a huge depth of knowledge about the parts of Word that you actually use
and be relatively ignorant about the features you have never needed. When
you do suddenly need to use those features, you have to start pretty much
from scratch to learn them, just as a Civil War buff asked to teach an
ancient history class might have to do a bit of boning up on the subject to
get up to speed.

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

On that note, I'd just like to say that sometimes, I feel that a Ph.D.
should be offered for Microsoft Word. The fact that the knowledge is
proprietarily driven and ephemeral is immaterial, since the same can
be said for high tech. In fact, it can be argued the expertise in
Word seems to have more staying power than some (if not many) areas of
high tech graduate degrees. As well, much of high tech research is
also driven by companies.