Hi George:
1) Decide how much information you actually want to put in your header or
footer. Let's assume that it is no more than two lines of text. If it is,
you will annoy your readers intensely
2) Go to Format>Document and set your page margins. The default one inch
top and bottom is fine.
3) Now decide where you want the header or footer to appear in the margin.
Normally it's vertically centred, so specify half your margin size: half an
inch.
OK your way out. One trick to headers and footers is to know that Word will
automatically expand the header/footer area if it needs to to accommodate
the header or footer.
Now, go to View>Header and Footer. Clear out anything you see in there,
then type your text.
When you have finished, click "Close" on the toolbar that sprang up.
Chances are, that's the step you missed. If you do not close Header and
Footer view, you do indeed see dotted blocks of white space where the
headers and footers are, and you can't type in the text!
Now: Be aware that each Section of a document has potentially three headers
and three footers: Left, Right, and First. If you have set your document up
to have a "Different First Page" header, you have an extra header. A "first
page" and an "other pages" header, and the same for the footers.
If you have set your document up with alternating left and right margins to
print odd and even pages, you have a left and right header. So potentially
you have three headers and three footers in each section.
Now think about section breaks. A Section Break is a storage for
"Page-level" properties. Changing the paper size or changing the headers
and footers are the most common reason for using a section break. If you
have a section break, you potentially have a new set of headers and footers
in each section break. However the default (and what most people do) is set
the subsequent section break headers and footers to "Same as Previous",
which causes the headers and footers to be copied through the document.
Now here is your most important, and most confusing piece of information:
The Section Break that stores the headers and footers for a piece of text is
the section break FOLLOWING that piece of text. In most documents, it is
the default section break, which is hidden beneath the very last paragraph
mark in the document. You can't see it, but trust us, it's there
If
the document has more than one section break, the one controlling each
section of text is the one below that piece of text.
This is a rule that holds good throughout Word: The container for the
properties of a piece of text is the one following (and usually,
terminating) that piece of text. So: the formatting for a paragraph is
stored in the paragraph mark that ends the paragraph. The formatting for a
word is stored in the space following the word.
Headers and footers are actually straightforward, but they're complex. You
need to read the Help carefully, word for word. And practice. On a JUNK
document!! Work slowly and meticulously, changing only one thing at a time.
Know that Word has several "views" of a document. The Normal View does not
show headers and footers. It is both stripped down for editing speed, and
enhanced to show non-printing things that make editing easier. I use it for
all text creation. Page Layout view shows the document at 99 per cent
WYSIWYG. It's a bit power-hungry for large document editing, but great for
proofing. It shows the headers and footers, but you cannot edit them.
Header and Footer View shows editable headers and footers, but the text is
not editable in this view. The reason is very simple: the text of the
headers and footers is nowhere near the text of the page: all the headers
and footers are rows in a table that is stored at the very end of the
document, behind the last paragraph mark. Finally you have Print Preview
View. This is as close to 100 per cent WYSIWYG as a screen display can get.
And you can edit it: click the magnifying glass icon until it is NOT
selected and Print Preview is editable. WARNING: Print Preview is very
seriously power-hungry! Don't do "much" editing in this view, or you are
likely to run the system out of both CPU cycles and memory. In which case,
Word will crash when it can't attract the power it needs to generate the
Print Preview View.
Hope this helps
from said:
Hi I'm George and I'm having problems setting headers and footers for a
document. Secondly, and the reason I'm actually writing, my header footer
program has grabbed onto my document and won't let go. By that I mean I have
these blocks of white space in the document that show up as blocks with
dotted lines around them when I open the program. And...I don't know how to
shut this off and restore the document.
So I have two questions:
1) How do I shut off this mess.
2) Where do I go for simple instruction on how to use the header footer
program easily.
Thanks to anyone for whom this is a slam dunk.
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John McGhie, Microsoft MVP: Word for Macintosh and Word for Windows
Consultant Technical Writer <
[email protected]>
+61 4 1209 1410; Sydney, Australia: GMT + 10 hrs
