Paste docs into different template based new doc doesn't change st

[OldLincoln]

Word 2003 - SP3 XP Home - SP2

We have dozens of source docs with coordinated style names matching several
templates that have the same names but modified formatting. The idea is to
create a new doc from the right template & paste in the source doc to assume
the new template styles. Good idea but cannot make it work.

The styles are carrying the list type as a prefix e.g.; 5.0 Pro_Header & 1)
Pro_Header and my guess is that keeps them from matching up. In the style
definitions they both are Pro_Header without mention of number style.

I really, really must make this work and soon and will appreciate any help
or point to a direction, etc.

 

[Idaho Word Man]

The only way I know of to make it work is to use "Edit - Paste Special -
Unformatted Text." That brings the text of your source document in as
unformatted text, with no styles or formatting. You'll need to reformat the
plain text to the new styles in your template.

Reformatting the text is a pain, but any other method of pasting text will
carry the styles from the original document, and you'll end up with two sets
of styles -- one from the new and one from the old.

Fred

 

[OldLincoln]

That makes the process dependent on me doing it. I may be better off just
maintaining 12 sets of originals each formatted for a client.

Being stubborn, I started looking into code to replace one style with
another in a way that refreshes the active document. If you know that will
not work please let me know, or hopefully, that it will work, please toss me
a bone.

Thanks

Earle

 

[OldLincoln]

What if I stuck a leading tag in front of each (unformatted) paragraph
indicating the style I want then walked the doc with code to apply it?
Earle

 

[Stefan Blom]

You can certainly use the Find and Replace dialog box (Ctrl+H) to replace
styles (assuming that the replacement style exists in the document of
course). In the dialog box, be sure to click the More button so that you can
see all options. Then place the insertion point in the "Find what" box,
click the Format button, click Style, and choose the desired style. Repeat
for the "Replace with" box.

 

[OldLincoln]

Thanks, I got everything working by prepending a tag to each paragraph and
making the entire doc Normal. Then via code it walks the doc applying the
correct format.

Works great, I just make a new doc via a macro I put in a new "Templates"
menu item, copy/paste the doc to format, then run the code. It applies the
format from the template and it's done.

Earle

 

[Stefan Blom]

I'm glad you got it sorted, and thank you for the follow-up.