How do I align vertically a 2nd column in centre page?

E

enrico

Writing an assignment and cannot work out how to align vertically a second
column of words in centre page.They're coming out like a ondulating column. I
think depends on lenghth of previous word,in first column, but can't figure
out a way to put them straight.
E.G. Water Paani
Book Pustuk
Glasses Chushma......etc etc
I'm using word office 2003.
Due for monday,
PLEASE help!!!!!!
 
S

Stefan Blom

Are you saying that you don't want the newspaper columns to be
balanced? Then do the following: On the Tools menu, click Options.
Click the Compatibility tab and check the option to "Don't balance
columns for Continuous section starts". Text won't wrap to the second
column until it reaches the end of the page.

--
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP


in message
news:[email protected]...
 
E

enrico

No, not really.
Don't know how to explain it technically but will try to make it clear....
I want the centre column to be vertically aligned, for words in that column
start at different points on horizontal grid
E.G. I have something like
Water aaaa
Book bbbb
Sugar cccc
Tea dddd
Home eeee
If you take aaa bbb ccc ddd eee,they look like being on an ondulated,
irregular vertical line,and I want them to be straight, all word starting at
the same point, on a straight vertical line.
And can I correct this problem or I 'l need to write everything anew?
Thanx a lot...
 
J

jem01354

Enrico, how did you create the columns? It sounds like you used the space
bar to create the space between the two columns. If you didn't use the space
bar, did you use the Tab key ... or did you create a table?

I'm sure your problem can be fixed but I need to know how it was caused in
the first place. Whatever you do, don't type it again (yet) and above all
.... Don't panic!
 
E

enrico

Hi, yes, I created the columns with space bar, (i suppose that means,
different word length, different starting point for 2nd column word).
Then, following a suggestion I tried highlighting a piece of text, then
format-column etc etc
The first worked, the 2nd column went aligned, but on the following blank
page page 8) appeared a frame, the same I've used on the cover page of the
project.
Found the problem as frame appears in the format-column-2 column preview but
don't know how to prevent it..
And then, anyway, on the second piece it didn't work as it became a single
column , with word in second column going under correspective word in first
column...
(!!!!!!)
Not panicking, just going mad!!!!
 
J

jem01354

OK, now we can fix it. It might look complicated but it's not; if you follow
my instructions carefully, it will work.

You’re going to convert your text to a table, but first you have to do this.
Replace ALL of the spaces that are between the two words with a comma, so
they look like this:

Water,aaaa
Book,bbbb etc

When you’ve done that, highlight the lines of text. On the Table menu,
click Convert > Text to Table. On the dialogue box it should show Number of
columns: 2 and down at the bottom, Separate text at: Commas. Click OK.

That should have put your text into a 2-column table and the second column
should be lined up perfectly. If it isn't, it's because you've still got
spaces in front of some of the words.

You can reduce the width of the first column by dragging its right-hand
border to the left. Point to the border and when you get the two-headed
horizontal arrow with a split line down the middle, click and drag to the
left.

To remove the table borders, put the cursor anywhere in the table, then on
the Format menu select Borders and Shading; the Borders tab should be at the
front. At the top left-hand side click None > OK. You may still be able to
see the pale grey gridlines, but these don't print.

The reason your way didn't work wasn't really because of the different
lengths of the words; it was because of the font. If you'd used Courier New
it would have worked perfectly because every character (letter, space etc)
takes up exactly the same amount of space, so lining things up is easy.
However, with other fonts (and I suspect you used Times New Roman), each
character takes up a different amount of space, which makes lining things up
using the space bar almost impossible.

Anyway, I can't stop to chat ... I have a cake to bake!

Good luck! ... and please let me know how you get on.
 

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