Word refuses relative numbering in references (\r)

[Emanuel Vahid Towfigh]

Hi everybody,

I'm working on a document with a numbered outline and posting
cross-references all over the place. Normally, the way I'm inserting the
cross-references, only the relative context should be shown. Instead, the
reference always shows the full context, although the \r argument is placed
in the field. The error occurs on Word for Mac as well as Word for Windows.
Any idea what I might be doing wrong? I'd be most grateful for swift
responses, as my deadline is coming close...

If possible, please also respond directly to my private eMail address.

Thanks for your kind attention!

Emanuel

 

[Emanuel Vahid Towfigh]

I need to add that this only happens in footnotes (style "Footnote Text",
based on "Normal"; in the text itself, the reference is relative). Any idea
how to change that? Thanks!
Emanuel.

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Oh, new information....didn't see that on the Mac group.

Since it only happens in Footnotes, and cross-platform, I'm gonna gamble
that this is something hardcoded that you can't change. Possibly a
bug--except that since Word doesn't know the difference between footnotes
and endnotes, it might be deliberate--picture a relative numbered reference
in an endnote? Totally unusable. And Word tends to govern footnotes and
endnotes by the very same laws even when not applicable.

Since many people also skim the footnotes out of reading context, I'd say
that relative references in the footnotes could also be a little
user-un-friendly, and would encourage you to let it go. But I don't know
your submission guidelines.

Find and Replace would probably ease the fix after the fact, if you want to
manually do it.

DM

 

[Emanuel Vahid Towfigh]

Hi Daiya,
nice to see you here, again . I just posted the guess you're making on
the .mac newsgroup...:

"As time goes by, I seem to get closer to the core of the problem. It seems,
Word simply can only do "full context" or "no context" in footnotes. It
cannot, unfortunately, make a relative context, nor can it show "above" or
"below" in footnotes, I believe simply because Word does not analyse the
position of te footnote relative to the text. At least that's my guess. Can
you - or anyone else - confirm this?"

Your hint to endnotes, in this respect, makes perfectly sense.

How do you suggest I could manually do that?
Thanks, once more, for your kind help, and cheers,
Emanuel

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Another thing to keep in mind is that footnotes and endnotes are in a
separate "layer" in Word, so their location relative to the text is somewhat
fluid.

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

"As time goes by, I seem to get closer to the core of the problem. It seems,

Word simply can only do "full context" or "no context" in footnotes. It
cannot, unfortunately, make a relative context, nor can it show "above" or
"below" in footnotes, I believe simply because Word does not analyse the
position of te footnote relative to the text. At least that's my guess. Can
you - or anyone else - confirm this?"

Your hint to endnotes, in this respect, makes perfectly sense.

Suzanne's layer point is probably closer to correct.

How do you suggest I could manually do that?

I was thinking that you could delete the extra numbers after the fact, using
Find and Replace to remove them, and setting it to search only footnotes,
but now I am not so sure, as I suspect Word conceives of the cross-reference
as one number, not 3 digits 1.2.4, so F&R might not find it. Unless you
converted them to plain text first, then you could do it, but then they
would never update, so you would only want to do that on a copy, and you
might still have to do Find Next repeatedly instead of Replace All.

DM