Word 2007's 'Style Sets' vs Word 2008's 'Document Themes'?

[thegreatcurve]

Are Word 2008's document themes equivalent to Word 2007's "style sets"?

I had assumed so, but I'm having trouble with the 'save theme' button in the formatting palette. I opened a Word 2007 document with a style set applied to it, and clicked 'save theme' to save it as a document theme.

Unfortunately it didn't seem to take, as the newly created document theme appears to be merely a copy of the default theme, instead of reflecting the styles of the document, which I expected. Is this a bug, or am I missing something?

 

[John McGhie]

No: They are the same as a Word 2007 Theme

A Style Set is a different animal.

A Style Set is saved in a Template, not a Theme.

You need to save a Template, with its Style Set, then apply a Theme to it,
and save again.

The Template and the Theme will be saved independently.

Hope this helps

Are Word 2008's document themes equivalent to Word 2007's "style sets"?

I had assumed so, but I'm having trouble with the 'save theme' button in the
formatting palette. I opened a Word 2007 document with a style set applied to
it, and clicked 'save theme' to save it as a document theme.

Unfortunately it didn't seem to take, as the newly created document theme
appears to be merely a copy of the default theme, instead of reflecting the
styles of the document, which I expected. Is this a bug, or am I missing
something?

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia

 

[CyberTaz]

Just expanding a little on what John offered... And I'm sure he will correct
me if my interpretation misses the mark

The formatting carried by a standard Theme (in either version) is linked to
Word's built-in styles... custom styles are not saved as a part of a custom
Theme. The custom theme remembers what attributes to apply to content
controlled by the corresponding built-in style. It sounds like what you're
seeing is exactly that... content to which custom styles have been applied
does not get reformatted when you apply the Theme, which is to be expected.

If you apply - for example - Heading 1 style to a heading instead of your
custom style the heading will take on the attributes of the Theme you
select. Following John's instruction you wind up with a custom template
which includes your custom styles to which a Theme has been "attached".

You might also be interested in the "Themes and font problem" thread.

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

 

[thegreatcurve]

Thanks for the advice, even though it wasn't at all what I wanted to hear.

If I understand correctly, there's no way to use Word 07's style set feature in Word 08 without creating different document templates for each style set. This is inconvenient, but more importantly it prevents you from changing style sets 'on the fly' as you could in Word 07.

I suppose I'm the idiot for assuming that Word 08 would be even remotely feature comparable to Word 07. Caveat emptor, I guess...

 

[John McGhie]

Actually, a Word 2007 Theme and Style Sheet and Template SHOULD work in Word
2008, provided you have all three on the machine in question.

The Word 2007 Style Set is saved as part of the Template, from memory: not
as part of the Theme.

Hope this helps

Thanks for the advice, even though it wasn't at all what I wanted to hear.

If I understand correctly, there's no way to use Word 07's style set feature
in Word 08 without creating different document templates for each style set.
This is inconvenient, but more importantly it prevents you from changing style
sets 'on the fly' as you could in Word 07.

I suppose I'm the idiot for assuming that Word 08 would be even remotely
feature comparable to Word 07. Caveat emptor, I guess...

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia