TextWrapping options

[Victor]

Ok. A very tough question appeared on an MS Word test. Essentially, you had
to choose the best text wrapping setting to get text with an image to appear
a certain way.
The example shown had text on 3 sides of a right-aligned image. The options
included
SQUARE and TIGHT, among others that were obviously wrong. my question is,
what is the difference between Square and Tight? as far as I can tell, they
do the same thing.

 

[Jay Freedman]

Ok. A very tough question appeared on an MS Word test. Essentially, you had
to choose the best text wrapping setting to get text with an image to appear
a certain way.
The example shown had text on 3 sides of a right-aligned image. The options
included
SQUARE and TIGHT, among others that were obviously wrong. my question is,
what is the difference between Square and Tight? as far as I can tell, they
do the same thing.

If the graphic has a transparent background and non-rectangular contents, then
the Tight wrapping will let the text extend across the background almost to the
contents. In the same situation, Square will keep the text outside the graphic's
rectangular bounding box.

To see this work, insert a clip art -- for example, search for 'cat' and choose
the one that shows a veterinarian and a child holding a cat. Set the wrapping to
Tight. If the graphic is at the right margin, you'll probably have to make the
surrounding text justified in order to see the effect.

 

[Jean-Guy Marcil]

Ok. A very tough question appeared on an MS Word test. Essentially, you had
to choose the best text wrapping setting to get text with an image to appear
a certain way.
The example shown had text on 3 sides of a right-aligned image. The options
included
SQUARE and TIGHT, among others that were obviously wrong. my question is,
what is the difference between Square and Tight? as far as I can tell, they
do the same thing.

I'll do my best to answer this "tough" question... ;-)

If your image does not have any transparency, then, yes, they produce the
same result.

If you want to make sure that the text is aligned according to straight
lines around the image, use SQUARE.

With TIGHT, if you have transparent colours, the text will try to flow
inside the transparent area(s), which, depending on the complexity of the
transparent area(s), might give strange (hard to control) results...

 

[Beth Melton]

Let me guess, the image was square/rectangle, right? Tight wrapping allows
the text to wrap around an image. Take an oval image or drawing object for
example. If the wrapping is set to Tight then the text will wrap to the oval
shape. If it's set to Square the text will wrap to the bounding box which
will be a square/rectangle. Of course if the image is square then Square and
Tight will give you the same results. Additionally, as others have noted, if
the "blank/white" area around an image in the bounding box isn't transparent
then Square and Tight will take on the same appearance.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/HA102295841033.aspx