Searching in Header/Footer

[Dogwoodnc]

In Word XP, I need to search for all text formatted with specific font color
& size in all headers within a long document. There are many section breaks
(and thus several distinct headers) within the doc; there are no established
styles; however, all text to be located has the same font characteristics.

Example: Find all text formatted Verdana Bold Teal 14 point

Ultimately, I need to extract this text into a (blank) Word doc. (I also
need to set up a macro to do this same procedure in other docs.) I have been
able to do this for text outside the header header, but not for text within
the headers. Any suggestions??

Thanks in advance!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I can't help with a macro, and recorded macros based on Find usually don't
work correctly, but you can easily use the Find dialog to find and select
all the qualifying text:

1. Press Ctrl+F to open the Find dialog.

2. Click More to expand the dialog.

3. Click Format | Font and select the desired formatting.

4. If Word 2002 offers it, check the box for "Highlight all items found."

5. Click Find All. Once the items are selected, you can click the title bar
of the document to return focus to the document, then Ctrl+C to copy the
text, which you can paste into another document.

This works in Word 2003 but won't work in 2002 if it doesn't have the
"Highlight all items" feature (which I think it may not have). In that case,
you may be able to use the Styles and Formatting task pane the same way.
Make sure you have "Keep track of formatting" selected in Tools | Options |
Edit. If you see a "formatting" listing for Verdana Bold Teal 14 point, then
you can use Select All to select all the text formatted that way, copy it,
and paste it into another document.

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

 

[Dogwoodnc]

Thanks Suzanne & PamC for the suggestions! Unfortunately, neither worked
properly. OR I'm not doing something correctly!

--- While I have a "Highlight all items in" header/footer option (which I
had already tried), it does not seem to allow a search for "all" text --ie
searching for everything with a specific font/color/size instead of for a
specific text string. The * wildcard did not seem to be helpful either.

--- When I tried to search on the Styles & Formatting text pane, I could
place my cursor in a header and manually find some text in the desired
format, which brought the formatting into the box above Select All.... but
when I clicked Select All, the search went back to the non-header text and
did not return anything additional in the header. And what it returned in
the non-header text did NOT match the formatting of the header.

Perhaps I'm not doing something correctly? If so, any assistance would be
greatly appreciated! Also, if there any other ideas out there, that'd be
great too!

Thanks again!

 

[Dogwoodnc]

Thanks Suzanne & PamC for the suggestions! Unfortunately, neither worked
properly. OR I'm not doing something correctly!

--- While I have a "Highlight all items in" header/footer option (which I
had already tried), it does not seem to allow a search for "all" text --ie
searching for everything with a specific font/color/size instead of for a
specific text string. The * wildcard did not seem to be helpful either.

--- When I tried to search on the Styles & Formatting text pane, I could
place my cursor in a header and manually find some text in the desired
format, which brought the formatting into the box above Select All.... but
when I clicked Select All, the search went back to the non-header text and
did not return anything additional in the header. And what it returned in
the non-header text did NOT match the formatting of the header.

Perhaps I'm not doing something correctly? If so, any assistance would be
greatly appreciated! Also, if there any other ideas out there, that'd be
great too!

Thanks again!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Did you leave the "Find what" box blank? And did you select "Headers and
Footers" beside "Highlight all items found in"? That works for me.

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

 

[Dogwoodnc]

Yes, exactly. I left the Find What box blank, and checked Highlight all
documents in/Headers and Footers, and then selected the font characteristics
under More/Format/Font. And then Find All. It always comes back with No
Items Match -- but I KNOW there are text strings with those font
characteristics. If I try searching for a specific word, it works as long as
I do not specify font characteristics. (Searching for a specific word is not
what I want to do, but I tried it anyway!) As soon as I add the font
characteristics, it can't find anything. That's why it's puzzling!

 

[Dogwoodnc]

I might have just figured out something....
It appears that everything in the header is automatically assigned a
"header" style -- even though there is a variety of different formats in the
header (font colors, font sizes, alignment of title vs dates & page numbers,
etc). It all shows up at "header". I did not make this style assignment, so
I can only assume that Word did it systematically when I put the text in the
header.

I CAN search for ("highlight") all Header-style text via the Find box. That
gives me a lot of extraneous information -- since I only want/need the text
that's formatted Verdana 14 teal. BUT it's better than nothing.

Additional ideas are still appreciated!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Provided you don't specify style, you should be able to search for just the
font characteristics you describe. All I can say is that it works for me in
Word 2003.

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