Bending Word 2008 to my Color Wheel

[Hyland]

Version: 2008 Operating System: Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) Processor: Intel Bending Word 2008 to my Color Wheel

Howdy! I've been trying for a few weeks to create a way to easily change text from one color to another. Before you say "Duh!," please check out my very specific definition of the above. ☺

I'm an editor/designer and as I produce and distribute copy to my team, I am continually color coding various phrases, words, digits, what have you. I mark my queries to Paul in purple and Ronda in red. Once these folks get back to me, I change the type back to black. Once my doc is all black, I know that it's good to go on to the proofreader.

Styles? Love 'em, but they won't work in this situation.* I already have at least 15 total styles (paragraph & character) for this document. The text that I color code encompasses 4 character styles. 10 colors x 4 different character styles = way more styles than I want to add to my 15.

And the thing that Styles do/does(?) best has the potential to wreak havoc on my brain. Local, manual control is what I'm after.

I had a scheme: Themes* I just read (here) that Theme colors go wonky when opened in 2004. I'm glad that I never figured out how to create a theme! But I sure tried: for a while I thought that I could make my own color palette within a theme.

C-c-c-colors* Why not just use the standard colors in the Formatting Palette? I don't like 'em. The red, orange and light blue are okay, but I want my own purple, green and pink. (I know the HSB values.)

How I currently get "my" colors:* Font color > More colors > (goes to Mac colors. ah!) Click the pretty color, click ok. But that's more mousing and clicking than I want to do.

I did set an F key to apply the last color used, but 95% of the time I want a different color that the last one I used.

Track Changes* I know about track changes and I'd rather be tarred and feathered than use that "feature."

Would this work?* I know how to make a custom toolbar called "HB's colors."
I know how to assign a keyboard shortcut to an item in a toolbar.

What I don't know is make a blah-blah (I don't even know what it's called) that changes the selected text into a particular HSB value.

Is there such a thing?

In a perfect world I would have time to learn how to script, but that's not likely any time soon. Is scripting the only way to do such a thing?

Hey! You read this far? _You get a medal!_

Thanks,

Hyland B.

 

[Jeff Chapman]

Dear Hyland,

You can accomplish this by creating a few easy Automator
workflows (no scripting involved), one for each of the
colors that you want to apply.
Each workflow really only involves a single step,
which is changing the color of the selected text in Word.

If you create a custom workflow in Automator, you should see
the Word library items on the library pane at right.
There is a library item called "Apply Font Format Settings
to Word Documents". You can select it to apply to "selected
text" only, which is what you want.
Save the workflow to your [user name]/Shared/Microsoft User Data/
Word Script Menu Items/Sample Automator Workflows folder
as a workflow.
Take note of the filename you use - the last characters
you use will serve as keyboard shortcuts or hot keys
that will call your workflow. (You can see the filenames
of the currently existing workflows for reference.
They look rather cryptic, but if you compare them to the
actual script items in the Word application script menu
(that funny-looking scroll icon), you'll get the idea.
Quit Word and restart. You should now see your workflow in
the Word script menu, and should be able to select some text
and call your workflow using the keyboard shortcut you
assigned. It may take a couple of seconds for the workflow
to run each time, but it's much speedier than doing
it yourself.

Keep in mind that some versions of Office 2008 for Mac
do not include the Automator library for Office.
(The Home and Student version comes to mind.)
If you open Automator and still don't see anything
for Office, chances are that yours is one of them.

Let us know how it goes.

Jeff

 

[Hyland]

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the scoop! Alas, I *am* using the Home version... but this could be reason enough to upgrade to Pro.

I'm a tad hesitant to mess with that, though... especially if it involves uninstalling MS Home. MS apps being what they are, I'm superstitious that might cause an internal uprising.

- Hyland

 

[John McGhie]

You will get a complete civil war if you DON'T remove-before-installing when
you want to change "grades" within a version.

I still suggest that this is a job for "comments" and "styles", not fancy
scripts Filling a document with complex change-tracked direct
formatting is thrill-seeking, best avoided except by those of stout heart
and infinite patience

Cheers

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the scoop! Alas, I *am* using the Home version... but this could be
reason enough to upgrade to Pro.

I'm a tad hesitant to mess with that, though... especially if it involves
uninstalling MS Home. MS apps being what they are, I'm superstitious that
might cause an internal uprising.

- Hyland

--

The email below is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless I ask you to; or unless you intend to pay!

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Jeff Chapman]

Styles, indeed - on this I would concur. Keyboard shortcuts
can be assigned to styles as well.

I still suggest that this is a job for "comments" and "styles", not fancy
scripts

Jeff

 

[CyberTaz]

<snip>

I still suggest that this is a job for "comments" and "styles", not fancy
scripts

<snip>

Actually, it "would be" a job for the Highlighter if the assortment of
colors permitted the text to remain readable... And/or could be customized.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Hyland]

Hi John,

Thanks for the suggestion; I think I *will* use (character) styles and just make a bunch of keyboard shortcuts.

You wrote: &quot;Filling a document with complex change-tracked direct formatting is thrill-seeking, best avoided except by those of stout heart and infinite patience.&quot;

By &quot;change-tracked&quot; do you mean working with &quot;Track Changes&quot;? No problem! I don't like that thing -- nor do I trust it!

Thanks again!

 

[Hyland]

Hi Bob,

Yes, it sure *would* be nice if we could edit those garish &quot;Highlighter&quot; colors.

- Hyland

 

[Clive Huggan]

Hello Hyland,

For a few ideas on using keyboard shortcuts for character (and paragraph)
styles, take a look at ³Applying a style via keyboard shortcuts² on page 117
of some notes on the way I use Word for the Mac, titled "Bend Word to Your
Will", which are available as a free download from the Word MVPs' website
(http://word.mvps.org/Mac/Bend/BendWordToYourWill.html).

[Note: "Bend Word to your will" is designed to be used electronically and
most subjects are self-contained dictionary-style entries. If you decide to
read more widely than the item I've referred to, it's important to read the
front end of the document -- especially pages 3 and 5 -- so you can select
some Word settings that will allow you to use the document effectively.]

I agree re Track Changes. And if ever it¹s essential to see the changes, all
you need to do is choose ³Compare documents² on the Track Changes menu. This
leaves the original document free of corruption.

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is 5-11 hours different from the Americas and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
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[Hyland]

Hi Clive,

Thanks for your awesome book! &quot;Bend Word to my Color Wheel&quot; is a shout-out to your book.

I started with the very first page and I've almost read the whole thing. (You sort of scared me into not skipping any parts.)

You might be horrified to know what I am doing with your book. (Really, it's a compliment!) I'm under the hood... editing out all the stuff that I already know and/or the stuff that does not pertain to me. And uber-focusing on the stuff that does.

In the first 5% of the book you said about 20 things about your document-producing style that convinced me that we were separated at birth.

(That thing where you use styles in bright colors to tell you &quot;where&quot; you are in a long doc? I thought I was the only one that did that. Avoiding graphics like the plague in a Word doc? That's me; if it's pixels or vector I hightail it over to InDesign/ PShop/ Ill.

Anywho, I realized that Styles + Key commands and maybe a custom palette are the way to go.

THANKS for all of your words of wisdom!

-Hyland

 

[Clive Huggan]

Hello Hyland,

Thank you for your kind comments. ;-)

I can well understand your ³editing out all the stuff that I already know
and/or the stuff that does not pertain to me. And uber-focusing on the stuff
that does². I¹m a bit nervous about the effect on sanity of reading it all
through (be warned!) because I only ever look up material by using the Find
command and, less often, the table of contents and the associated hyperlinks
to pages ‹ so I¹m envious of your achievement .

I attach a custom palette to documents on which colleagues will work
intensively, but since I have not downgraded to Word 2008 I¹m unsure of how
feasible it is to create palettes in 2008. I expect I¹ll find out when I
eventually migrate to Word:Mac 2011...

Cheers,

Clive
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