Word Help not well documented

[phylk]

Version: 2008 Operating System: Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) There is no index in Word Help, which means that you have to go on a guessing trip to figure out a key word that will give the information you are looking for. I can understand not publishing a printed user manual, but Word does need to have better cross indexing. For example:

I just spent at least an hour trying to find directions for displaying the pane that runs alongside the document that shows the styles used. I know it has a name, but haven't used this feature for so long, I don't remember. I tried the following keywords in the Help search bubble: View, styles, pane, formatting.I can find how to show the navigation pane or the document map, but not that pane for the styles used.

First question - How do I access that pane?
Second question - Why doesn't Word show a alphabetical index of key words?

 

[CyberTaz]

You're absolutely correct ‹ Help is one of the real sore spots across the
board in Office 2008. Believe it or not, it's been improved a great deal
since the initial release... But still leaves much to be desired.

What you're looking for is collectively called the Toolbox. It's accessible
from the Toolbox button on the Standard Toolbar or by going to the View
menu. In the View menu you'll see all of its selectable Palettes listed.

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

 

[phylk]

I agree that the Help is pretty poor. Other iterations of Word Help had an index choice as well as table of contents. Why doesn't someone point out to Word that in putting together their Help section, they might be able to find a word processor that can make an index from all the features of a document. LOL

But I'm not looking for a Pallet of formatting. I wish I knew what this "feature" is called. It looks like the side panels that have the Navigation pane, but there are only two choices - thumbnails or document map.

I was using this style tool when somehow I turned it off. I cannot find out how to get it turned back on. This morning when I fired up the computer and opened the documents I was working on, by magic that missing panel is back. It resides between the Navigation panel and the document window. It is a list of the styles that are used opposite the paragraphs.

I am putting together a booklet and want to be sure my heading styles are applied consistently. I can compare against the document and quickly see discrepancies and make changes using the formatting/style bar.

 

[Michel Bintener]

Hi,

I think I know what you mean. This "section" is only visible in Draft
view, and it can be configured in Word>Preferences, View. The name of
this feature is "style area", and you can configure its width in this
specific section of the preferences. If the width is set to 0 you
obviously can't see it. And let me repeat: this style area is only
visible in Draft view; it doesn't appear in Print Layout view, or any
other view for that matter.

In your case, the solution might be as simple as switching to Draft
view. Try that first before you play around with the preferences.

 

[CyberTaz]

I appreciate what you're saying & trust me, quite a few have been on MacBU's
case about the gaping holes in Help. Although there have been improvements
made I would guess that the overwhelming bulk of their resources have been
dedicated to development of the next release. I wouldn't expect much more
enhancement of the Help in 2008 in the near future. Even so - and no offense
intended - indexed help doesn't do much good if you don't know the name of
what you're looking for. I'm afraid I'm still a bit unclear on that as well.
I can only think of 3 possibilities:

1- The Toolbox as described in my previous reply. It contains the Styles
list as a group within its Formatting Palette. The only difference from Word
2004 is that the Formatting Palette was separate from the other members of
the Toolbox [Scrapbook, Reference Tools, Compatibility Report, & Projects].
The Formatting Palette along with Citations & Objects Palette were
added/moved to the Toolbox in Office 2008.

There's a list at the bottom of the Styles group where you can choose to
display All Styles as opposed to Available Styles.

2- The Styles Area as described by Michel, which only appears when working
in Normal/Draft View.

3- The Navigation Pane available from the View Menu which has a list at the
top from which you can select Thumbnails or Document Map. What appears in
the Document Map is determined by the Styles used in the document but
displays nothing about the Styles themselves.

In Office for Windows 2003 & prior there is a feature used called Task Panes
& there is a specific Styles Task Pane. Something similar may have been used
in the Mac version back before the 2004 version but honestly can't
remember... Perhaps that's what you're recalling?

If I'm still off the mark here pleas be more descriptive of what you're
looking for. It would help if you not complicate that description by what
you may have found instead or what you're _not_ looking for. Where did it
show by default? Exactly what did it display? What did it enable you to do?

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