Outline Numbering of both headings and text

[Roger McCowan]

My aim is to develop a template in Word 2003 for a suite of documents in
which both headings and body text have outline numbering, viz:
1 A Heading 1
1.1 A Subheading 2
1.1.1 Body text level 3
1.1.2 More Body text level 3
1.2 Another Subheading 2
1.2.1 Even more Body text level 3

The Headings generally range from Level 1 through to Level 5, whilst the
text is no higher than Level 2, and ranges down to level 6.

I have endeavoured to follow the guidance in the MVP articles "How to create
numbered headings or outline numbering in your Microsoft Word document" by
Shauna Kelly, and "Word's numbering explained" by MVP John McGhie.
My attempts so far "almost" work, the failure occurring with body text that
follows another heading. Using the example above, "Even more Body text level
3" has the number 1.1.3, instead of 1.2.1

I have tried both setting the styles for the body text to be based on the
Heading Levels, and setting the styles to be based on a hierarchy commencing
at "Text Level 1", in exactly the same way as Shauna describes for headings,
in her MVP article. But neither works. And I have ensured that I used a
single Outline Numbering "style" from the gallery of 7 alternatives
throughout (having initially reset them all to "default" before commencing).

 

[Robert M. Franz (RMF)]

Hi Roger

My aim is to develop a template in Word 2003 for a suite of documents in
which both headings and body text have outline numbering, viz:
1 A Heading 1
1.1 A Subheading 2
1.1.1 Body text level 3
1.1.2 More Body text level 3
1.2 Another Subheading 2
1.2.1 Even more Body text level 3

The Headings generally range from Level 1 through to Level 5, whilst the
text is no higher than Level 2, and ranges down to level 6.

That means you can have a heading 4, say:

1.2.2.1 A heading 4

followed by text as:

1.2.2.1.1 body text level, ahem, what -- 5?

And then comes, say, a heading 5, what numbering should it have?

Generally, I'm all with John when he discourages anything with more than
2 or 3 ouline levels: it does not help to guide the reader anymore. In
_your_ case, I don't see how the reader shall ever distinguish a body
text in level 4 with a heading in level 4. [Well, I must admit I haven't
really comprehended your requirements! It looks like one huge outline
setup, but with no way to distinguish between headings and bodytext.]

You could possibly get to where you want to be by way of field-based
numbering (SEQ, or in this case, LISTNUM, rather). That way, you can
insert the LISTNUM fields for your body text and make them kind of part
of the otherwise style-based numbering. I wouldn't want to get there,
but it seems a possible path.

0.2¢
Robert