Wildcard for non-printing characters

[Amy]

Hi, Is there one wildcard that would find all non-printing characters, such
as spaces and tabs? Or do I need to do a find for each type of non-printing
character? I am using Word 2003. I think Word 97 used to have ^w, but that
does not seem to work in 2003.

Thank you, Amy

 

[Russ]

Amy,

What you can use in "Find" textbox depends on whether the wildcards checkbox
is checked or not. The "Special" drop down list actually changes because of
that checkmark. If you can't see the "Special" button, you need to click on
the big down arrowhead button at the lower left in the "Find and Replace"
Dialog Window to expand it fully.

^w actually needs the wildcards option unchecked to work.


Also the "Special" drop down list changes depending on whether the find or
replace input textbox has focus.

 

[Klaus Linke]

Hi, Is there one wildcard that would find all non-printing characters,
such
as spaces and tabs? Or do I need to do a find for each type of
non-printing
character? I am using Word 2003. I think Word 97 used to have ^w, but that
does not seem to work in 2003.

Thank you, Amy

Hi Amy,

You can search for combinations of spaces, tabs, or non-breaking spaces:
Find what: [^32^t^s]{1,}

Regards,
Klaus

 

[Graham Mayor]

See http://www.gmayor.com/replace_using_wildcards.htm

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


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[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Spaces and tabs are actually printing characters as the printer does act
upon them. I would call a non-printing character something that is ignored
by the printer.

Better if you tell us exactly what it is that you want to do. I can't
imagine that you want to find the space between each word.<g>

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP