Varying Alignment in a Text Box

[Guest]

Any idea why ALL the text would change to the alignment chosen rather than
just the selected paragraph? I'm only selecting or clicking into the
paragraph I want to change -- I'm not selecting all the text or clicking on
the text box border, I'm just highlighting what I want to change -- and it
changes the alignment of all the paragraphs. I know I should be able to
change the alignment of each paragraph in a text box because I can do it at
my machine -- this is someone else's machine where I can't get it to work.
Thanks.

 

[Echo S]

Any idea why ALL the text would change to the alignment chosen rather than
just the selected paragraph? I'm only selecting or clicking into the
paragraph I want to change -- I'm not selecting all the text or clicking
on
the text box border, I'm just highlighting what I want to change -- and it
changes the alignment of all the paragraphs. I know I should be able to
change the alignment of each paragraph in a text box because I can do it
at
my machine -- this is someone else's machine where I can't get it to work.
Thanks.

One guess is the creator used Shift+Enter to create line breaks instead of
Enter. Shift+Enter is a "soft return," so there is a line break, but
everything's technically in the same paragraph. Enter is a "hard return" and
creates a new paragraph.

However, if you're messing with the same slide and it's behaving differently
on two different machines, then that's not it.

 

[Guest]

Hilight and use the tab key

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

Any idea why ALL the text would change to the alignment chosen rather than
just the selected paragraph?

Are you changing paragraph alignment (ie, Format, Alignment, Left|Right|Center
etc) or changing the text anchor point in the Text Box tab of the formatting
dialog box?

If the former, it *should* work the way you expect.

If Echo's suggestion doesn't explain it, let us know which version of PPT you
have. And if you can post a small example file on the web where we can have a
look that'd be very useful


I'm only selecting or clicking into the

 

[Guest]

I already know it's not soft versus hard returns because I checked that out.
I'm using the alignment buttons in the formatting toolbar, which I assume are
equivalent to Format|Alignment. I'm not sure the version. Will check that
out and post tomorrow. Nighty night and thanks.

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

I already know it's not soft versus hard returns because I checked that out.
I'm using the alignment buttons in the formatting toolbar, which I assume are
equivalent to Format|Alignment.

Yep, it shouldn't matter which you use. It's just easier to describe the menu
steps (your formatting toolbar might not be there, but if the menu bar's gone, ya
got bigger problems than making some text right-justified). ;-)

I'm not sure the version. Will check that

out and post tomorrow. Nighty night and thanks.

See ya tomorrow. Oh, and don't forget to post an example on the web someplace if
possible.

 

[Guest]

I've run into this problem myself. It seems to be a bug of some kind, and
I'm not sure what causes it--I've only had the problem when I've gotten
someone else's slides. However, I do have a solution, though it will sound
odd.

Go to the Format Autoshape dialog box's Text tab. Turn on Word Wrap. When
the text box has done this problem to me, Word Wrap has been off, and turning
it on clears it.

 

[Echo S]

oooooh, lights coming on. I have run into something similar a couple of
times. But in my case it wasn't word wrap, it was the text anchor being in
the middle. Even if I'd apply left alignment, that middle text anchor
setting would override it. Dang, it about made me nuts until I figured it
out.

The text anchor is in the same place as the word wrap Linda's describing --
Format|Autoshape, Object, Text box, whatever and choose the Text tab. I'd be
sure to check both word wrap as Linda describes and the text anchor -- maybe
changing from "middle centered" to "middle" would work?

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

oooooh, lights coming on. I have run into something similar a couple of
times. But in my case it wasn't word wrap, it was the text anchor being in
the middle. Even if I'd apply left alignment, that middle text anchor
setting would override it. Dang, it about made me nuts until I figured it
out.

The text anchor is in the same place as the word wrap Linda's describing --
Format|Autoshape, Object, Text box, whatever and choose the Text tab. I'd be
sure to check both word wrap as Linda describes and the text anchor -- maybe
changing from "middle centered" to "middle" would work?

Depending on what Christina's seeing, could be it.

With the text box set to Middle alignment, you can still set individual
paragraphs to left/center/right align, but left/right aligned text floats ...
the left/right margins PPT aligns to depend on the width of the text.

 

[Guest]

Linda's suggestion worked! Very nice, thank you all very much. _c

 

[Echo S]

Glad to hear it! That one was a puzzler.