Best to have all one's styles in "Normal Template" ?

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

So when "we" were doing the list style exercise of creating a list
paragraph style and a list style, we used some made up names. I gather
changing names was just for practice. When you do the real thing you
keep MS's name convention for styles as much as possible. But you may
define that style differently for a specialized purpose and retain that
in a separate template. Correct?

Yes. Again, you cannot make "rules" that always hold true at this level, or
you will end up with a rulebook twice the size of the London phone book.
And nobody puts their number in the phone book anymore because nobody can
find their number in it: it's too big

1) When I am showing you how to create a style, I will start from scratch
so you know how to create one.

2) When I am showing you how to create a List Style, I have to start from
scratch, because there are no existing List Styles.

3) If I were to show you how to create a Table Style, I could do either,
but I would probably start from scratch because the Microsoft ones are so
horrid and so useless that life is to short to correct the detritus
contained in them.

And you don't change the names like Clive does. It seems like you both
start the first step in any linked style from scratch, not linked to
Normal style but Clive changes the names and you don't. Correct?

I don't change the names of any built-in styles: that's correct. That's
because I want to leave the document with the standard style names, so other
users can find their way around.

But I set the formatting of the ones I intend to use, appropriately for each
document or template.

I also do not want to deal with the complexities around which ones you can
rename and which ones won't let you. Word actually has THREE classes of
style in the style table, not two. But it never describes or reveals the
difference in the user interface. In fact, it is difficult to find it when
you are programming also, and if you get it wrong, your code blows up.

There are "Custom Styles" and "Built-in Styles". Within the built-in
styles, there is a subset that doesn't seem to have an official name:
sometimes referred to as "Default" styles. You cannot delete a default
style, Word won't let you. And if you try to re-name it, Word will add the
name you create to the default name. If you try to create a style with the
same name, it will refuse. It's annoying and complex, and you won't see it
until you get into VBA.

Again: Come back to the 50,000-foot-view. What are you trying to DO? You
are trying to save effort. Most importantly, save effort for YOU. Saving
effort for other users is a "nice to have", but you are the one who matters


You will do a lot less work if you customise the built-in styles, because
their definitions will usually be close to what you will want to specify in
any case.

If you send documents for editing to anyone else, I suggest that you leave
the style names unchanged, otherwise they will probably start doing strange
things in your document, which you will have to fix when you get it back!

Although Clive is quite right: many users out there have yet to find out how
much work they save by using styles, and for them, it will make no
difference. But it's extra work for you to rename things; and try to
remember what you renamed them to!

I have a different constraint: as m'learned colleague from Canberra has
alluded, the possibility of getting engineers and senior business executives
to "do" this stuff is inversely and directly proportional to how difficult
you make it. So I will often do things that involve a lot of work for me,
in order to get the documents being returned closer to what the company
specifies. Because *I* will have to fix them if they are not...

And working backwards and forwards between platforms, trying to learn the
various different keystrokes of each is just too much work, so I don't
bother

Cheers


--

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]

 

[Norm]

Hi Clive:

Thanks very much. Tardy in saying so..... we've been back in Minnesota
for some holiday celebration with family.

Now today back to learning Word.

In the way you work, you rename they styles rather than retain the
built-in style names. Correct?

Yes, except for Heading styles, to which I simply add a suffix so I can
easily use a keyboard shortcut.[/QUOTE]

Got that. I'm not sure I'm versed at the suffix usage but slowly
understanding some of the shortcuts you pros use.
(Reading on below in yours, I now get it. Thanks.)

That situation brings different imperatives from John's; and there are
different imperatives again if you don't need to consider anyone else when
developing a Word document (if only!).>

The background with rationale is very helpful. My situation, which is
very "vanilla," is more similar to yours.

Correct, other than Word's default heading styles. Note that "heading"
doesn't include my own "nontoc heading" styles (for anyone else watching
this thread: do a Find command in "Bend Word to Your Will"); they are based
on style "bt").

OK... Now I get it.

By the way, no huge amount of memorizing is required for all this: all I
need to remember are the abbreviations for my 2 body text styles, 2x2 types
of sub-paragraphs, and headings -- which are just the level number. So doing
this isn't just the territory of industrial-level Word users; it is very
easy for a lightweight user of Word to remember too.

An Aha moment for me. Thanks for going back over that for the
Word-challenged.

And as John put it so
brilliantly, "The lazier you are, the better you will use Word."




Almost invariably. But I might modify a style slightly in a particular
document (see my earlier remarks on why I don't bother much with different
templates any more) while leaving the Normal template untouched.

When you say "while leaving the Normal template untouched" does that
mean untouched from your saved Style definitions?

"The upshot of all this is that nowadays I have all my styles in the Normal
template, although I also keep a template specifically with all my
formatting in it."? -- That template is only a backup resource. It's a junk
heap. I transfer any new styles I create into it (naming them slightly
differently if there are more than one used for the same purpose). On *very*
rare occasions I have gone in and rummage around to see if I want to
retrieve one of them. Like rummaging around my workshop. ;-)

Does this mean you would save a new to be used style in the Normal
template and then save that same new style to our "backup resource"
template?

Causing one's spouse and offspring to do that form of exercise brings much
vicarious pleasure, I find. It's a bloke-of-a-certain-age thing... ;-)

;-) ;-)

Thanks very much.

Cheers and Happy New Year,

Norm

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

Happy New Year.

Back from a vacation to the Midwest.... we were trying to find colder
and snowier weather ..... and now back in Cambridge.

I don't change the names of any built-in styles: that's correct. That's
because I want to leave the document with the standard style names, so other
users can find their way around.

But I set the formatting of the ones I intend to use, appropriately for each
document or template.

Do you have a template that contains just the ones you use on a regular
basis?

I also do not want to deal with the complexities around which ones you can
rename and which ones won't let you. Word actually has THREE classes of
style in the style table, not two. But it never describes or reveals the
difference in the user interface. In fact, it is difficult to find it when
you are programming also, and if you get it wrong, your code blows up.

MS does want to make it complicated for seemingly no reason. :-(

Again: Come back to the 50,000-foot-view. What are you trying to DO? You
are trying to save effort. Most importantly, save effort for YOU. Saving
effort for other users is a "nice to have", but you are the one who matters

Learning Word at the feet of Clive and John may get me to 50,000 for
other projects as well. A nice plus.

You will do a lot less work if you customise the built-in styles, because
their definitions will usually be close to what you will want to specify in
any case.

Lazy is good!

Thanks much,

Norm H
Cambridge, MA

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

Well, I am pleased that you are not perspiring in the heat and listening to
the bushfire helicopters thundering overhead like we are

Cheers

Hi John:

Happy New Year.

Back from a vacation to the Midwest.... we were trying to find colder
and snowier weather ..... and now back in Cambridge.




Do you have a template that contains just the ones you use on a regular
basis?


MS does want to make it complicated for seemingly no reason. :-(



Learning Word at the feet of Clive and John may get me to 50,000 for
other projects as well. A nice plus.


Lazy is good!

Thanks much,

Norm H
Cambridge, MA

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

Hi Norm:

Well, I am pleased that you are not perspiring in the heat and listening to
the bushfire helicopters thundering overhead like we are

I hope that your heat and drought end soon.... I guess that is a
"needless to say" at this point.

Maybe the Copenhagen meetings should have been held in AUS.


Did you have any comments/recommendations on that question?


<snip>

Thanks,

Norm

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

Maybe the Copenhagen meetings should have been held in AUS.

That would have made no difference. Combating climate change requires us to
undergo pain now in order to have an effect in 50 years. Democracy cannot
do this job, because politicians will do only what will win an election in
three year's time.

Did you have any comments/recommendations on that question?

No. The object, remember, is to "Bend Word to YOUR will."

I have several templates, each configured with styles, macros, toolbars and
autotexts appropriate to the various document types that I frequently work
on.

Producing a document is a "workflow" that contains a number of defined steps
(whether formally defined or just in your head makes no difference: the
steps must all happen, in the required sequence, or the document does not
happen.)

I almost completely wipe the Word user interface and the built-in styles and
start again to get things exactly the way I want them. When dealing with a
4,000 page document (as I currently am) that makes the difference between
two days spent on "formatting" and (literally) two months.

You can make a "smaller" response than that, because you have a different
problem The question you constantly need to ask is "What saves me
effort?"

You always have to do the work "somewhere".

For a school project, the degree of similarity between it and the next one
is low, and the ability to re-use the work is almost absent. Doing the work
in the document is easier, so that's where you do it.

I have been doing documents such as the one I am currently working on for 30
years. I am using tools and definitions in the current document that I made
25 years ago. Back then, I adopted the theory of "Do the whole job, and get
it right the first time; then you will never have to do it again." I
customised a template for that kind of document 25 years ago. Two years
ago, I changed the font specifications to Calibri and Cambria. Three years
ago, I upgraded the template to a .dotm. I set up the leading in the styles
in 1986 and I have not changed it since.

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

Maybe the Copenhagen meetings should have been held in AUS.

That would have made no difference. Combating climate change requires us to
undergo pain now in order to have an effect in 50 years. Democracy cannot
do this job, because politicians will do only what will win an election in
three year's time.[/QUOTE]

Correct. I agree. Some advantages of a constitutional monarchy....
depending on who he/she is.

No. The object, remember, is to "Bend Word to YOUR will."

I have several templates, each configured with styles, macros, toolbars and
autotexts appropriate to the various document types that I frequently work
on.

<snip>

Thank you for the above and the additional explanation. I now see how
that "flows."

If you were to look at All Styles in one of your templates or the Normal
template would it show all these styles that you've defined over the
years and would it be evident which are "yours" ?

Thanks again,

Norm

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

If you were to look at All Styles in one of your templates or the Normal
template would it show all these styles that you've defined over the
years and would it be evident which are "yours" ?

They are ALL mine. All the styles in any template I own have been
customised to do the job for which the template has been defined.

I bend Word to MY will, and I suggest that you do likewise. Body Text is a
built-in style, but in most of my templates it is set to either 10 pts Arial
or 11 pts Calibri, depending on the customer's requirement.

I rarely create a style from scratch: I use the default set: that's what
it's there for, and that avoids me having to re-train my staff for each kind
of document we do.

Currently I am working on a project where the Document Designer has not
understood this, and has created a majority of the styles required from
scratch, ignoring the default set.

He is "getting" an unholy mess. With 150 contributors to the document, he
now doesn't have time to re-train everyone. With 4,000 controlled documents
in play, he now does not have time to put them right.

Because he departed from "the normal way people use Word" he now has a
crisis on his hands. We are going to have to build some very serious
automation to put this right, and we may not have time.

Fortunately none of this is likely to concern you, because you are unlikely
to have to create 4,000-page tender documents in 12 weeks, which is about
average for major commercial bids. But anyone in here who is likely to have
to do this should learn from this lesson: in commercial and professional
service, small and seemingly insignificant departures from industry standard
practice can result in a disaster of crisis proportions. This is not a
space into which you introduce people who "think they know what they are
doing". Engage only staff with a track record of proving it under fire

Cheers

Thanks again,

Norm

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

If you were to look at All Styles in one of your templates or the Normal
template would it show all these styles that you've defined over the
years and would it be evident which are "yours" ?

They are ALL mine. All the styles in any template I own have been
customised to do the job for which the template has been defined.[/QUOTE]

Does that mean that only the styles you use are in the All Styles list
of a specific template and not all the original ones predefined by MS?

I bend Word to MY will, and I suggest that you do likewise. Body Text is a
built-in style, but in most of my templates it is set to either 10 pts Arial
or 11 pts Calibri, depending on the customer's requirement.

I need to go back to your info on the "built-in" type of styles but I
gather from the above you can modify but not delete.

Thanks,

Norm

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

Does that mean that only the styles you use are in the All Styles list
of a specific template and not all the original ones predefined by MS?

All styles in the document are in the All Styles list. It makes no
difference who created them, or who modified them.

The Microsoft Styles are simply a list of "Suggested Names". Microsoft
suggests that you use those names for your styles. If you follow that
recommendation (and use those styles in the correct places) any person
familiar with a Microsoft Word document will know how to edit and format the
document without breaking it.

So I use the Microsoft styles. Except in rare (very rare...) occasions, all
the style names I use are the names Microsoft suggests. In one document out
of a hundred, I may add one. Sometimes two.

But the content of those styles is what I say it will be. In a blank
document, they're empty, as we already know. I add the properties that will
format things according to my purposes.

Again: Come up out of the detail and look at the overarching picture.

Every document must have a style table: without it, the document is corrupt
and cannot be opened. That style table must contain some styles, or you
can't format the document at all. All formatting is a style in Word,
whether you know the name of that style or not. The style table will always
contain the default style set: Word will put them there. Might as well use
them: so you need to do a lot less work when setting up the formatting for
the document.

I need to go back to your info on the "built-in" type of styles but I
gather from the above you can modify but not delete.

You can delete "some" but not "all" the default styles. The list of which
ones you can and which you can't keeps changing.

I suggest "Don't attempt to delete any!" Might as well use them: they're
already there, and it will save you work. If you start deleting styles,
then you have to deal with all the complexities of which ones to delete,
whether Word will allow you to delete them, what will happen to the
inheritance chains if you delete some, and whether or not Word will put them
back in.

Life is too short: use the default style set and bend it to your will...

Cheers

--

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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

All styles in the document are in the All Styles list. It makes no
difference who created them, or who modified them.

If the styles are not defined (are "empty") are they in the list?

Thanks,

Norm

 

[John McGhie]

Yes. Read my dissertation on "empty" soft drink trucks.

The truck contains no drinks, but the boxes the drinks came in are clearly
visible on the truck. They are also listed in the driver's cargo manifest


Cheers

Hi John:



If the styles are not defined (are "empty") are they in the list?

Thanks,

Norm

--

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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

Yes. Read my dissertation on "empty" soft drink trucks.

Did again. I have it when reading that but....

I think I found, looking back on this thread, why I'm so confused on
this. I think I'm misreading what you posted a while back..

You said a long time ago :

If you do not choose a different template, then the entire style table
comes
from the Normal template if you have customised any of the styles in
Normal.
If you have not customised any styles in Normal, the Normal style set is
all
"empty" and it is not copied to the document.

I read this as meaning if I open a New Document then I will not have any
styles since they are empty.

The truck contains no drinks, but the boxes the drinks came in are clearly
visible on the truck. They are also listed in the driver's cargo manifest

Thanks.

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

I read this as meaning if I open a New Document then I will not have any
styles since they are empty.

Oh, it's not all your fault. Word goes out of its way to give the wrong
impression here.

Word 2007 has the whole Styles Control dialog, and in Word 2007 you can see
that by default, most style names have their "visibility" set to "Hide until
used".

Mac Word 2008 has a cut-down version of that mechanism, which lacks the
ability to set visibility. So when you first create a document, it appears
that there are only four styles in it.

The rest don't become visible until you apply them to text.

It's like a letter from your bank...

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

Mac Word 2008 has a cut-down version of that mechanism, which lacks the
ability to set visibility. So when you first create a document, it appears
that there are only four styles in it.

I open Word 2008. It opens a new document. I go to the Style dialog
window and count..... I got 278 styles and I may have 3 or 4 test ones.

So those are all visible at the outset and if I understand you, many are
empty.

Does that make sense?

The rest don't become visible until you apply them to text.

Are there more?

Thanks.

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

That means that at least one style in your Normal template has been
customised, so the entire style table is being copied from Normal template,
and the visibility settings will come in with them.

If I drop down the "Styles" drop-down in a fresh blank document on this Mac,
I see seven styles. That simply means that I don't usually use this machine
for production , so I haven't throw the Normal template on the blacksmith's
anvil and bent it severely out of shape

It's also an indication that my working processes rely more often on
attached templates, and that's where most of my customisations are.

Celebrate individuality: ruthlessly bend Word to YOUR will

Cheers

Hi John:



I open Word 2008. It opens a new document. I go to the Style dialog
window and count..... I got 278 styles and I may have 3 or 4 test ones.

So those are all visible at the outset and if I understand you, many are
empty.

Does that make sense?


Are there more?

Thanks.

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

That means that at least one style in your Normal template has been
customised, so the entire style table is being copied from Normal template,
and the visibility settings will come in with them.

In order to see all those I opened the Format/Style window and selected
All Styles.

Why such a difference from the 147 styles that you always reference?

If I drop down the "Styles" drop-down in a fresh blank document on this Mac,
I see seven styles.

I have nine styles on the docs drop-down window. They are made up of 4
customized, 3 heading styles, 1 for Clear Formatting, and then Normal.
Yup.... adds to 9.

Thanks,

Norm


PS.....

On 12/01/10 1:29 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Norm"

That is not the Queen's english! She will have me tarred and feathered!

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Norm:

In order to see all those I opened the Format/Style window and selected
All Styles.

Why such a difference from the 147 styles that you always reference?

To answer that question, you would need to open each style and inspect all
of its properties

It's about ten years since I counted the default styles in Word (and I am
not going to do it right now...) it's probably more than 147 by now, because
they have added a heap of useless Table styles

If it will make you happy, I shall henceforth refer to "More than 150"

What is the principle we are looking for here? Does a document have default
styles? Yes. Are there enough for our needs? Yes. Do some appear before
they are used? Yes. Do any not appear if they are used? No. What causes
them to appear? The settings of their properties. You see where I am going
with this? The thing that matters is the mechanism, not the number.

The number of possible combinations is of the order of 3 to the power 200 to
the power 1,000. Apple's calculator gives up and tells me the result is
"Infinity". Your documents will be different from mine. Two documents I
create ten minutes apart are likely (almost certain...) to be different.

Let's just re-state the principle: "You will get more than 150 default
styles in a document. Any you have customised, plus any others you create,
will be visible." Others will appear automatically if Word needs them.

That is not the Queen's english! She will have me tarred and feathered!

So will your wife, and due to her closer association with you, it is to she
whom my petition for your demise will be directed in the first instance!

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]

 

[Norm]

Hi John:

On 13/01/10 9:00 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "Norm"


To answer that question, you would need to open each style and inspect all
of its properties

When my wife asks what I'm doing tabulating, my answer will confirm her
opinion of my sanity arrived at (in the most recent instance) as a
result of the time I've spent learning Word.

If it will make you happy, I shall henceforth refer to "More than 150"

I shall be overjoyed.

The thing that matters is the mechanism, not the number.

Understood.

Let's just re-state the principle: "You will get more than 150 default
styles in a document. Any you have customised, plus any others you create,
will be visible." Others will appear automatically if Word needs them.

Think it pierced the thick stuff.

Thanks,

Norm

 

[John McGhie]

Wives in general have an imperfect understanding of men's priorities and
imperatives. It is our lot in life to struggle on in the face of constant
opposition.

Cheers

Hi John:




When my wife asks what I'm doing tabulating, my answer will confirm her
opinion of my sanity arrived at (in the most recent instance) as a
result of the time I've spent learning Word.


I shall be overjoyed.



Understood.



Think it pierced the thick stuff.

Thanks,

Norm

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters 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]