Smart quotes and index codes

[nohogumbo]

I work in a law firm and we repeatedly have documents that have been
marked for index that have smart quotes that go "stupid". lol What I
mean is that the closing quote mark after the index marking appears as
an open quote, e.g., is the example of a term like (the "Issuer"{ XE
"Issuer" }" the final quote would appear as an open quote.

This usually arises when we have to do a Find & Replace to conform all
of the quotes in a document to be smart quotes. And it does not matter
whether the index markings are showing or hidden when we perform the
Find & Replace. The result is the same. We end up with the term being
surrounded by two open quotes.

I know that the default quotes within the index code itself are
straight quotes and we are not concerned about their appearance. It is
only the quotes around the term that actually appears in the document
that we are talking about.

Any suggestions?

Valary

 

[Mike Starr]

Hi Valary

Well, first, in the example you gave, there are more quotes than
necessary... you gave _"Issuer"{ XE"Issuer" }"_ and if that's what you've
actually got, then smart quotes are behaving as expected because that last
quote would appear to the program to be an opening quote. However, if what
you really meant to type was that you were seeing _"Issuer{ XE"Issuer" }"_
(no quote immediately preceding the index entry) then the problem is
probably that the index entry is inside your quotes and confuses smart
quotes.

You don't mention how the index entry is created but if it's not created
automatically, put the cursor outside the quotes when creating the index
entry. I don't know how bright smart quotes are but if you're viewing the
index entry, put the cursor right outside the braces and select the index
entry (it should grab the whole index entry "automagically"). Then you can
drag and drop the index entry outside the quotes and see if smart quotes
realizes it really needs a closing quote where it inadvertantly put an
opening quote.

Another thing to consider is your corporate style... are quotes actually
required? If not, consider replacing instances of quotes with a character
style formatted to emphasize the text (my own is default paragraph font,
bold and dark blue).

Mike

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

I work in a law firm and we repeatedly have documents that have been

marked for index that have smart quotes that go "stupid". lol What I
mean is that the closing quote mark after the index marking appears as
an open quote, e.g., is the example of a term like (the "Issuer"{ XE
"Issuer" }" the final quote would appear as an open quote.

This usually arises when we have to do a Find & Replace to conform all
of the quotes in a document to be smart quotes. And it does not matter
whether the index markings are showing or hidden when we perform the
Find & Replace. The result is the same. We end up with the term being
surrounded by two open quotes.

I know that the default quotes within the index code itself are
straight quotes and we are not concerned about their appearance. It is
only the quotes around the term that actually appears in the document
that we are talking about.

When you use Find/Replace you can specify formatting, as well as text to
be found. With the focus in the "Find what" box, click the "Format"
button, choose font, and make sure "Hidden" is NOT activated. Now Find
should pick up only quotes that are NOT hidden.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 17 2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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[nohogumbo]

You were correct. I got a little quote happy and the quote immediately
preceding the index code in my example was an error in my typing.

And yes, we usually create the index codes by selecting the text and
marking for index which is why the code ends up in the middle of the
quotes. We can certainly move the code, I was just hoping to avoid all
that extra manual work. Too bad that when we mark entries the way Word
was built that it has the quirky side effect with the quotes.

And yes, I would love to use character styles but our old guard of
attorneys insist on their tried and true quotes.

Thanks Mike.

 

[nohogumbo]

And thanks to you as well Cindy.

I tried the No hidden formatting and alas it's still confused. As I
responded to Mike, I guess I was just hoping that Word would play nice
with us since we make every effort to use best Word practices when
working on our documents.

Thanks again

 

[Robert M. Franz (RMF)]

Hi Valary

I work in a law firm and we repeatedly have documents that have been
marked for index that have smart quotes that go "stupid". lol What I
mean is that the closing quote mark after the index marking appears as
an open quote, e.g., is the example of a term like (the "Issuer"{ XE
"Issuer" }" the final quote would appear as an open quote.

Have you considered placing the XE-field _after_ the closing quote entierly?

2cents
Robert