I've put together some helpful tips on using Styles (text formatting) in Microsoft Word, in response to a posting in one of the forums from someone who was having problems.

There are two versions of the document: a PDF version, and a zip archive containing a Word version. These are both on my website, and can be downloaded by following one of the links below.

The PDF version

The Zipped Word version

(The latter should cause browsers to save, or else prompt whether to save, the file to the local hard drive.)

Alex

Ah!!! You're very kind.

Thanks!

That's superb. A lot of work too.

For those who think you already know word, check this document out. You'll be amazed at what you don't know.

You're a real star for doing this. I'm sure this will be widely appreciated.

Colin M

Thanks for the appreciative comments, Colin. I wasn't sure, when I posted it, how generally useful this would be. I suppose I assume that most frequent Word users will know most of this.

The hardest bit was getting all the screenshots from the Style dialogs. While they're open, you can't get at the main document, which meant I kept having to open them to grab the screenshot, then close the dialog and paste the screenshot into the document.

Alex

There's something I intended to mention, but forgot. At the top-right of each of the Style dialogs, just to the left of the "close" button, there's a button with a question mark on it. If you click that, and then put your cursor over one of the items on the dialog, and then click again, you will get a useful hint about what that item is for.

Alex

Thanks, Alex - really great of you to do this. Very useful!

All I need now is a market that pays money for something like this

(I've got one, really: it's called 'freelance software development' )

(By the way, I've just discovered something strange about WW: It interprets a ' follwed by a ) as a smiley. Like this: '

Alex

At Snowbell's suggestion, I've added a table of contents to the start of this document, to make it easier to find things. I've also added captions to the figures, and included them in the table of contents.

The updated document is available by following the links I gave in my first posting. In addition, I've made the Word version available directly, without needing to use WinZip. The link for this is:

http://www.alexhazel.me.uk/Text%20Formatting%20in%20Word.doc

You will find that this document opens in the browser (if you are using Internet Explorer), rather than automatically coming through as a download. To save it as a Word document on your PC, use the Save As option from the File menu in the browser. (Netscape users don't have this difficulty, as it asks you whether to open the document in Word or save the file to your disk.)

Alex

Alex, that's brilliant. May I post the link on the MPhil message board? There was an exasperated-sounding query on there recently about how to get students to format things properly but painlessly in Word.

Emma

By all means, Emma.

Great, thanks!

Emma

Printed it out. Many thanks, alex.

Thank you Alex, it's very kind and helpful of you, cheers.
Kathryn