Word:Mac v. X Outlining

[Jim White]

How can I make the title of a paragraph (e.g., "1. Operational Uses.")
which is on the same line with the beginning text of the paragraph,
into an oultine heading to be used in an automatically generated Table
of Contents without making the entire paragraph that outline level?
Essentially, I want to start my Normal Text on the same line that my
outline heading paragraph title is on, and be able to generate a Table
of Contents that includes only the paragraph title, not the remainder
of the paragraph.. As below, "1. Operational Uses." would be the
paragraph title, Outline Level 3, and "The widget ..." would be normal
body text.

1. Operational Uses. The widget is designed to produce lithium
crystals to enable the craft to achieve warp speed ...

I appreciate any help offered.

 

[Dayo Mitchell]

This page lists a few different options, depending on Word version--I don't
know whether Word X has a Style Separator but the other suggestions should
work:

http://home.zebra.net/~sbarnhill/RunInSidehead.htm

DM

 

[Elliott Roper]

This page lists a few different options, depending on Word version--I don't
know whether Word X has a Style Separator but the other suggestions should
work:

http://home.zebra.net/~sbarnhill/RunInSidehead.htm

DM

Paragraph marks as hidden text! Why didn't I think of that?

I'm off to change my higher numbered heading styles to make use of it.

And to make it much nicer, this simple macro

Sub Run_in_Head()
'
' Run_in_Head Macro
' Macro recorded 03-03-2004 by Elliott Roper
'
Selection.MoveLeft Unit:=wdWord, Count:=1, Extend:=wdExtend
Selection.Font.Hidden = wdToggle
Selection.TypeText Text:=" "
End Sub

I assigned it to ctrl-alt-r, and use it like this.

Create heading para and body para. cmd-up to position the insertion
point at the beginning of the body paragraph, then ctrl-alt-r. The
macro, as you can plainly see, selects the preceding paragraph mark,
makes it hidden and then inserts a visible space. It looks so-oo cool
as the two leap together.

Thanks Dayo. That was a grinny moment.

Now I really have to study the numbering magic from McGhie's outline
list post what I squirreled away somewhere.

 

[JE McGimpsey]

1. Operational Uses. The widget is designed to produce lithium
crystals to enable the craft to achieve warp speed ...

I appreciate any help offered.

After Dayo's excellent find, the only help I can offer is that the
correct term for the warp-drive matter/anti-matter reaction container is
"dilithium crystals".

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word]]

STOOOP!!!! That's a highly dangerous technique that should not be attempted
on long documents!! That's why you didn't think of it

In a Word document, the Paragraph is a fundamental structural unit. Word
does not take kindly to having them coming and going without warning, and it
is inclined to express its frustration in the time-honoured manner -- lots
of crashes and corruptions.

It's fine for short, simple documents (read: not many pictures, tables or
section breaks) that will not get much editing. Completely fatal for long
and complex documents.

In Word XP and above, the Style Separator "is" a hidden paragraph mark, but
the application is coded to expect them

Hope this helps

Paragraph marks as hidden text! Why didn't I think of that?

I'm off to change my higher numbered heading styles to make use of it.

And to make it much nicer, this simple macro

Sub Run_in_Head()
'
' Run_in_Head Macro
' Macro recorded 03-03-2004 by Elliott Roper
'
Selection.MoveLeft Unit:=wdWord, Count:=1, Extend:=wdExtend
Selection.Font.Hidden = wdToggle
Selection.TypeText Text:=" "
End Sub

I assigned it to ctrl-alt-r, and use it like this.

Create heading para and body para. cmd-up to position the insertion
point at the beginning of the body paragraph, then ctrl-alt-r. The
macro, as you can plainly see, selects the preceding paragraph mark,
makes it hidden and then inserts a visible space. It looks so-oo cool
as the two leap together.

Thanks Dayo. That was a grinny moment.

Now I really have to study the numbering magic from McGhie's outline
list post what I squirreled away somewhere.

--

Please respond only to the newsgroup to preserve the thread.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. GMT + 10 Hrs
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Elliott Roper]

Snipped cunning plan for getting run-in heads by making the paragraph
mark between heading and body style into hidden text.

STOOOP!!!! That's a highly dangerous technique that should not be attempted
on long documents!! That's why you didn't think of it

In a Word document, the Paragraph is a fundamental structural unit. Word
does not take kindly to having them coming and going without warning, and it
is inclined to express its frustration in the time-honoured manner -- lots
of crashes and corruptions.

It's fine for short, simple documents (read: not many pictures, tables or
section breaks) that will not get much editing. Completely fatal for long
and complex documents.

In Word XP and above, the Style Separator "is" a hidden paragraph mark, but
the application is coded to expect them

Hope this helps

Oh bugger. I'll admit I only tested it on a short document. It cured a
long sore point - getting run-in heads into the TOC without explicitly
flagging text.
Why should hiding the para upset Word so much? It looks like such an
innocent thing.

I guess I'll have to hope the style separator makes it to the new
version.

Damn! I was on a high for a while.

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word]]

Hi Elliott:

Why should hiding the para upset Word so much? It looks like such an
innocent thing.

The paragraph mark is actually a "property container" that contains or
references something like 250 different pieces of information. You could
think of it as a fairly large table with multiple columns of values. Many
of the values are byte offsets to various other pieces of information.

Whenever Word does anything to a paragraph, it has to re-knit all the offset
pointers together into a woolly jumper. If it doesn't get it right, the
document is now corrupt and none of it can be read.

I guess I'll have to hope the style separator makes it to the new
version.

Damn! I was on a high for a while.

Oh, it's a legitimate technique: Suzanne Barnhill uses it quite extensively.
You just have to be aware of the limitations involved. It's not a technique
we confidently recommend to new users, because it requires advanced
knowledge of word-processing and a reasonable understanding of the Word
document object model so you know how to stay out of trouble when editing a
document that contains the technique.

The first thing you should do is put large red letters in hidden text at the
top of the document explaining what is going on, or the person following you
will destroy all your hard work.

Using numbering with the technique requires special treatment: you have to
use field-based numbering using the ListNum or SEQ fields, because List
Template numbering is treated as a paragraph property, so if the paragraph
is hidden, so is the numbering.

You have to understand that tables are a special case of paragraph, a
paragraph with children, if you will, Using the technique adjacent to a
table practically guarantees a document corruption because Word does not
manage to keep that many balls in the air when repaginating.

You have to understand that graphical elements that are floating are
anchored to the nearest paragraph. If it happens to be one of those, you
can leave a figure suspended without an anchor: instant corruption.

You have to know that Change Tracking also works on hidden text, and if it
contains hidden text, document corruption is likely.

You have to realise that if you send the document up to Word 2003, the Word
2003 user's security settings must be set to NOT reveal hidden text on save,
or all your run-in headings will all be revealed.

You have to know that transporting the document down to the Word 6 PC
formats will reveal the hidden text, because paragraphs cannot be hidden in
that format. Just what happens in Acrobat I am not sure: I encourage you to
try it out when you do NOT have a deadline, because I predict some
fireworks.

Footnotes and Endnotes whose anchors are in such paragraphs may take on a
mind of their own, and cross-references may suddenly call in the whole
chapter if a paragraph suddenly reveals or hides.

Other than that and a few other gotchas I've forgotten to list, it's a
simple and effective technique that solves a particular need in Word ...

Hope this helps

--

Please respond only to the newsgroup to preserve the thread.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. GMT + 10 Hrs
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Elliott Roper]

Hi Elliott:

Using numbering with the technique requires special treatment: you have to
use field-based numbering using the ListNum or SEQ fields, because List
Template numbering is treated as a paragraph property, so if the paragraph
is hidden, so is the numbering.

Oh, that is a show stopper. It did the TOC nicely though.

Other than that and a few other gotchas I've forgotten to list, it's a
simple and effective technique that solves a particular need in Word ...

OK, You talked me out of that. I'll wait for 2004 before changing the
habits of a lifetime.

Thanks