too many spaces

[Guest]

When editing my document. I was told to use the show/hide feature to delete
any extra spaces. Extra being more than 2 from the period to the next
sentence. On some sentences the show/hide will put 1 dot between the word but
then ther is a space after the dot and the next letter. It looks as though it
is trying to show me that there is only 1 space there but you can see that
there is an extra space. I am not sure if my settings our correct but I set
in the grammer settings 1 space after each period thinking this would take
the extra space out but no such luck.

 

[Guest]

If your paragraphs are justified to both margins, then the width of a single
space will vary as Word adjusts space width to make each line equal length.
Trust the number of dots - they indicate the correct space count. BTW, modern
typography specifies a SINGLE space after an end-of-sentence period.
Typically, you don't want mutliple spaces anywhere in a doc. To align text,
use tabs or indents, never multiple spaces. I recommend you run Replace, find
two spaces, replace with single space, replace all, repeat until zero
changes.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

You will see extra space if the text is justified, but if you see only one
dot, then there is only one space character.

--
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.

 

[Guest]

Thank you Ted and Suzanne, I understand it a lot more now. How do I get to
the replace feature, Ted.

 

[Guest]

Nevermind, I found it under Edit. Thank you !!

Thank you Ted and Suzanne, I understand it a lot more now. How do I get to
the replace feature, Ted.

 

[Guest]

Ted, Having thought about this more. Is this replace feature going to take
out the double spaces after each period as well. Ultimately, I want 2 spaces
after each period and 1 space in between the words within the document. How
can I use the replace feature to get the single spaces in the document but
keep the double spaces after periods and colon headings.
Heidi

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

As Ted has said, unless you're using a monospaced font, you really *don't*
want two spaces after a period.

--
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.

 

[Guest]

Hi Suzanne, okay I get it now. I guess when I think about it I end up
deleating them anyway. I will run the replace after each document and
replace double spaces with single spaces. BTW, the font that I use for most
of my documents is Ariel 11.

Thanks again,
Heidi

 

[Guest]

Would Ariel 11 be a monospaced font?

Hi Suzanne, okay I get it now. I guess when I think about it I end up
deleating them anyway. I will run the replace after each document and
replace double spaces with single spaces. BTW, the font that I use for most
of my documents is Ariel 11.

Thanks again,
Heidi

 

[Shauna Kelly]

Hi Heidi

No. A font like Courier is monospaced, which means that every letter takes
up the same amount of horizontal space. Arial is proportionally spaced, so
that in a word like "illumination" you can see that the i's and l's take up
very little space, but the m takes up a lot of space.

You might find the following article interesting:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Font

Hope this helps.

Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP.
http://www.shaunakelly.com/word