Copying Outline Numbered Text Among Documents - Word 2002 - Is it Broken?

[Julie]

Hi,

Word 2002, SR3, Windows 2K

I have poured through thread after thread and KB docs and cannot seem to
find the short answer to this question.

Is the ability to paste numbered text among documents in Word XP broken to
the point where paste as unformatted is the only safe option even if the
schemes are healthy?

Conditions:

- Healthy outline numbered schemes exist in target and source document. All
styles are properly linked to the list template in both documents.
- There are only very minor differences in the schemes between the two
documents - as to tab and text positions.
- List template in both target and source document are named (sometimes same
name, sometimes different names - same result)
- There is no history in either document of any numbering formats directly
applied to text
- Both documents originated in Word XP

In Word2000, I can paste outline numbered text from document to document
reliably under those conditions. The pasted text takes on the style and
list format properties of the target document. Not so, it seems, with Word
2002. It's a dog's breakfast!

I have turned Word 2002 on its side and tried out numerous different
flavours of paste option settings, and cannot get the desired result - that
being that the pasted text takes on the style and list properties of the
target document. I did experience the "disappearing number problem" and
SR3 resolved that, but other problems prevail.

Soon, I must decide whether to teach my users that they must "always" paste
numbered text as unformatted text when pasting to a different document.

Is it broken?

Thanks in advance,
Julie

 

[Margaret Aldis]

Hi Julie

I think it is broken. However, Ctrl-Q to reset to style after the paste
generally works.

 

[Julie]

Margaret,

I am very glad to hear someone else agree that it appears to be broken.

An idea I had was to provide a "Paste Numbered Text" macro to paste the text
then fix the numbering in the pasted text. However, before heading down
that road, I hope to confirm that it is indeed broken. So far, I have only
two yes votes on that - yours and mine. It would be very helpful for me to
have a few more votes in favour so that I don't end up with egg on my face
by suggesting that it is broken if, perhaps, there is simply a paste setting
that could be changed to correct the problem.

Thank you.

Regards,
Julie

 

[Jean-Guy Marcil]

Bonjour,

Dans son message, < Julie > écrivait :
In this message, < Julie > wrote:

|| Margaret,
||
|| I am very glad to hear someone else agree that it appears to be broken.
||
|| An idea I had was to provide a "Paste Numbered Text" macro to paste the
text
|| then fix the numbering in the pasted text. However, before heading
down
|| that road, I hope to confirm that it is indeed broken. So far, I have
only
|| two yes votes on that - yours and mine. It would be very helpful for me
to
|| have a few more votes in favour so that I don't end up with egg on my
face
|| by suggesting that it is broken if, perhaps, there is simply a paste
setting
|| that could be changed to correct the problem.
||

I agree with Margaret. I have done a project that involved copying/pasting
documents into a central one for impression (based on Office XP). I created
all templates and generated all numbered list with a macro (I ran the same
macro in all documents) so as to ensure that all numbered styles were
identical (including their list template name). Whenever I pasted from one
document to the destination document, I was losing all numbering. The
problem I had was that I could not do a general CTRL-Q to reset my
paragraphs because users wanted some flexibility that included manual
formatting. We agreed on a compromise: Manual format all paragraphs as much
as you want, except the numbered one. Then in my macro I had to add a SELECT
CASE to cycle through the pasted paragraphs so that I could selectively
apply CTRL-Q to numbered paragraphs only.


--
Salut!
_______________________________________
Jean-Guy Marcil - Word MVP
(e-mail address removed)
Word MVP site: http://www.word.mvps.org

 

[Julie]

Thanks Jean-Guy,

I too experienced the problem with losing all of the numbering, but it seems
(not sure) that THAT problem stopped upon application of SR3. I did not
work with XP pre-SR3 long enough to know for certain which bugs apply to the
various builds.

I am not losing numbering now, but the result of the paste still remains
unacceptable post SR-3 in other respects. Your solution is close to what I
am looking at for the "paste numbered text" macro.

Sounds like we all agree that it is broken, It would be good to know if
anyone out there has found a way to avoid these bugs without using a
programmatic workaround. It seems ridiculous that a programmatic workaround
would be required for something as simple as a paste when the schemes are
healthy. I was "wishing" that someone here would advise that a setting or
scheme property change would resolve the problem. I have noticed that
sometimes, not always, selecting the option to paste new list (which would
almost never be the option of choice for my users), produces the desired
result except, of course, that the numbering restarts). Unfortunately
though, selecting the option to paste as new list does not always work.
With more testing, the cause of the inconsistency may reveal itself, so
perhaps there is some potential there.

Regards,
Julie