Types of Styles and Methods of Changing Style

N

Norm

A style beginner is confused by the terminology.

Trying to understand the differences in "style" types: global, all
styles, user defined styles, styles in use and available styles. And
maybe there are others.

Plus, what appears in the style window in the Formatting Toolbar does
not match up with what is presented in the style list in the Formatting
Palette or in the Style window under Format/Style.

Is there a place to go in Word Help or online to understand this? I
haven't found it yet.

BTW, I'm using Word 2008.

Thanks for any tips.
 
H

Hyland

Hi Norm,

I've been wondering some of those things, too.

Here are some of my favorite style tips. None answer your question, but you might find them handy:

Begin the name your styles with an asterisk so that they appear at the top of the list:

Slug Headline Byline Body copy Caption

Or get fancy and number your styles in the order they appear in your doc: (The number will control what order they appear in the Styles menu.)

1-Slug
2-Headline
3-Byline
4-Body copy
5-Caption

Then you could get *super fancy* and assign F keys to the styles.

I name my styles like this so that on the days that my brain is moving slow, I have a little visual reminder of what's what:

1-Slug -- F1
2-Headline -- F2
3-Byline -- F3
4-Body Copy -- F4
5-Caption -- F5

Also handy:
- I assigned "Clear Formatting" to an F key
- "Modify style to match selection" - I use it all of the time.

Things I avoid like the plague:
- "Normal" style
- Any style sheet that I did not create myself (MS Word styles)

Hope that helps!

- Hyland
 
J

John McGhie

Hi Norm:

Those are not "Types" of styles. Those are "Selections" (in other words,
they are "views") from the Style Collection in the current document.

Microsoft has intentionally made this as confusing as possible, for reasons
that escape me. First, let's review the basics:

1) In Microsoft Word, ALL formatting is a "style", whether you think it is
or not. Internally, Word stores all formatting as styles.

2) Styles are not stored inline with the text, they are stored in a table
like a spreadsheet at the end of the document, below the last paragraph (and
thus, off the display and never shown) is a Styles Collection.

3) All styles are LOCAL to the document. So: anything you see in a list of
styles is currently in the document that contains the insertion point
(cursor).

When you create a document: it sets a reference to the template you created
it from, and copies ALL of the styles from that template into the document.
Unless you specify a different template (or double-click a different
template) that template is Normal.dotm.

If you look in the Formatting Palette, only two views are available (they
left one out, presumably an oversight).

If you look in Format>Style... There are three views available:

* All styles means just that: all of the styles that are available in the
document.

* Styles in Use supposedly means "Only the styles that have been applied to
text in this document". See below...

* User Defined Styles shows only the styles you have created that are not
part of Word's default list.

There is no view named "Global", but all styles in the Normal template are
always accessible in the document, so some users refer to these as "global
styles" because the Normal template is one of the "global templates".

In Windows Word, you can customise each of these views to show you only the
styles you select for each view. You can also restrict the formatting in
the document to only the list of styles you specify, and optionally, lock
that setting with a password.

Mac Word 2008 does not have those features, and it therefore tends to break
the style settings in any document that has them specified. A bug...

"Styles In Use" functionality is badly designed, but Mac BU can't change it
because it's a WinWord function. It literally means "Any style that is, or
ever has been, used in this document."

The style table in the document contains a column labelled "InUse". When
the document is created, all styles from the template are added to the
table. As new styles are created in the document, they are also added to
the table.

When each style is first applied to some text, the "InUse" cell for that
style is set to "True". The bug is that there is no mechanism to set it
back to False.

So if a style is applied to some text, and that text is subsequently deleted
from the document, the style name still appears in the "In Use" view. The
only way to actually delete a style from the document is to use VBA, and you
have to design your code very carefully, otherwise it is really easy to
corrupt the document internal structure so it won't open at all.

Hope this helps


A style beginner is confused by the terminology.

Trying to understand the differences in "style" types: global, all
styles, user defined styles, styles in use and available styles. And
maybe there are others.

Plus, what appears in the style window in the Formatting Toolbar does
not match up with what is presented in the style list in the Formatting
Palette or in the Style window under Format/Style.

Is there a place to go in Word Help or online to understand this? I
haven't found it yet.

BTW, I'm using Word 2008.

Thanks for any tips.

--

The email below is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless I ask you to; or unless you intend to pay!

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:john@mcghie.name
 
J

Jim Gordon Mac MVP

Norm said:
A style beginner is confused by the terminology.

Trying to understand the differences in "style" types: global, all
styles, user defined styles, styles in use and available styles. And
maybe there are others.

Plus, what appears in the style window in the Formatting Toolbar does
not match up with what is presented in the style list in the Formatting
Palette or in the Style window under Format/Style.

Is there a place to go in Word Help or online to understand this? I
haven't found it yet.

BTW, I'm using Word 2008.

Thanks for any tips.

Hi,

We put an extensive discussion on elements of style, how to make and
save them, how styles relate to captions, automatic tables of contents
and much more in the Office 2008 for Mac All-in-One For Dummies book. We
explain the differences between themes and styles, how to save
templates, etc.

Follow the link below to order the book from Amazon.com, but it's
available wherever Dummies books are sold. It's also available for iPod
Touch, iPhone, Kindle, and Adobe Books.

-Jim
 
N

Norm

John McGhie said:
Hi Norm:

Those are not "Types" of styles. Those are "Selections" (in other words,
they are "views") from the Style Collection in the current document.

I knew I was a beginner. Proof... I didn't get the post Subject correct.
;)

3) All styles are LOCAL to the document. So: anything you see in a list of
styles is currently in the document that contains the insertion point
(cursor).

I gather "currently in the document" does not mean it is currently
available since there are many more styles in All Styles than Available
Styles in the Palette or in the Format>Style window?


* User Defined Styles shows only the styles you have created that are not
part of Word's default list.

For that document of for this user in total?

Hope this helps

It does.

The parts that still escapes me are:

1. Sometimes the Toolbar Style window will have what appears to be all
styles in its drop-down list. At other times it appears to match
"Available Styles" or "Styles in Use."

2. Do I need to use the Organizer to add fonts to the document to use
them? Confused since in the Format>Style window All Styles appears to
list all styles.

Thanks.
 
C

CyberTaz

Huh???...

<snip>
The
only way to actually delete a style from the document is to use VBA, and you
have to design your code very carefully, otherwise it is really easy to
corrupt the document internal structure so it won't open at all.
<snip>

What about the Delete command from the drop-down of the Style's name in the
Formatting Palette? Or the Delete button in the Style dialog?

Perhaps the deleted Style continues to be listed it that "invisible" table
of Styles, but it certainly doesn't continue to be listed -- or available
for resurrection -- in the document. I've never resorted to VBA to remove an
unwanted Style.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
 
J

John McGhie

Hi Bob:

Good point. It's only certain groups of styles that can be deleted that
way: the "Built-in" styles cannot be: once they are used, they are visible
and you can't get rid of them.

Cheers


Huh???...

<snip>

<snip>

What about the Delete command from the drop-down of the Style's name in the
Formatting Palette? Or the Delete button in the Style dialog?

Perhaps the deleted Style continues to be listed it that "invisible" table
of Styles, but it certainly doesn't continue to be listed -- or available
for resurrection -- in the document. I've never resorted to VBA to remove an
unwanted Style.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:john@mcghie.name
 
J

John McGhie

Hi Norm:

This mechanism was designed by a programmer with a PhD in object-oriented
software architecture. It is brain-crackingly complex, and you have to be
utterly literal-minded to understand it.

I gather "currently in the document" does not mean it is currently
available since there are many more styles in All Styles than Available
Styles in the Palette or in the Format>Style window?

Currently in the document DOES mean currently available. If it's in the
document, it's available. If it's not in "Available Styles" that only means
that it has not yet been applied to any text.

Available Styles isn't really much use: the ones you want aren't there, and
the ones you no longer want to find are :)

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:john@mcghie.name
 
C

CyberTaz

Hi John;

Thanks for the clarification... It wasn't apparent to me that you were
referring to Built-in Styles only :) Even so...

I don't mean to be a thorn in your paw here, but I still respectfully
disagree. The only Built-in Styles I've found that can't be deleted from the
Available Styles list are those which first appear when you first create a
new document based on Normal (or Normal.dotm):

Heading 1
Heading 2
Heading 3
Normal

Additionally, once any of the other Heading 4-9 Styles are used they can't
be deleted from the list. There are a few others, such as Table Normal, No
List, Paragraph Font & perhaps a few more haven't encountered.

Any other Built-Ins *can* be deleted as I described in my previous reply. If
you delete any of those it is true that they are not removed from the
document ‹ they will continue to be included in the All Styles list.
However, they *are* removed from the Available Styles list... They don't
hang around cluttering up the list, nor do they continue to appear in the
Style In Use list, of course. The "trick" to deleting them is that you must
have Available Styles or Styles In Use selected when you use the Delete
command ‹ if All Styles is selected the Delete command is dimmed.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
 
N

Norm

Hi John:

John McGhie said:
This mechanism was designed by a programmer with a PhD in object-oriented
software architecture. It is brain-crackingly complex, and you have to be
utterly literal-minded to understand it.

Makes me feel a tad bit better when I am totally confused by this
"available," "all," and "in use" etc terminology.
Currently in the document DOES mean currently available. If it's in the
document, it's available. If it's not in "Available Styles" that only means
that it has not yet been applied to any text.

Then "All Styles" I gather are in the document? Or just available and in
use?

I'm going looking for that MS PhD and have a "chat" with her/him.
Available Styles isn't really much use: the ones you want aren't there, and
the ones you no longer want to find are :)

Got that. ;)

I'll go back to my Lists in Word project. :)

Thanks.
 
J

John McGhie

Hi Norm:

You're getting there:

All styles are in the document. Styles are always in the document: they may
be other places as well, but styles are always in the currently open
document or they do not exist.

Remember that all formatting is held as styles in a Table of Formatting.
Looks like an Excel spreadsheet.

In a blank document, there are 147 rows in that spreadsheet, containing the
names of the built-in styles in column 1.

In Column 2, there is a binary "Used/Not Used" flag. That flag is set to
"Unused" until the style is applied to some text.

Until the flag goes true, the Style remains invisible, except in the All
Styles list.

But the style exists. It is in the Style Table. And the Style Table is in
the document.

Then "All Styles" I gather are in the document? Or just available and in
use?

I'm going looking for that MS PhD and have a "chat" with her/him.

When you find him, can I have second whack?

Cheers
--

The email below is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless I ask you to; or unless you intend to pay!

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:john@mcghie.name
 
N

Norm

John McGhie said:
But the style exists. It is in the Style Table. And the Style Table is in
the document.

And once in the document that Style Table stays in that document.
Correct?

Thanks for the education on Styles in documents. Appreciate.
 
J

John McGhie

Hi Norm:

The Style Table is a "required" component of the document structure.

If it wasn't there, the file would not be a Word document, and wouldn't open
in Word.

So yes, the style table always remains in the document. But the content of
it can and does get updated and/or replaced, when you cause that to happen.

From the Tools>Templates and Add-ins dialog, "Automatically update styles on
open" replaces the style table each time the document opens, with whatever
style table is in the attached template. That's usually too much of a good
thing, so we usually turn that off.

If you leave "Automatically update" set for a particular style, any change
to the formatting of a paragraph formatted with that style will update the
document's style table. That's also usually disconcerting: the source of
the constant bleats of "My whole document reformatted when I made some words
bold" bleats you see in here at least once a week :)

So turn that off too.

Cheers

And once in the document that Style Table stays in that document.
Correct?

Thanks for the education on Styles in documents. Appreciate.

--

The email below is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless I ask you to; or unless you intend to pay!

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:john@mcghie.name
 
N

Norm

John McGhie said:
So yes, the style table always remains in the document. But the content of
it can and does get updated and/or replaced, when you cause that to happen.


So turn that off too.

Now I understand and I'll leave both off. :)

Thanks much.
 

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