Stabilizing pagination [Word 97] (Word 97)

[Sarah]

Anyone know a quick way to keep the pagination stable in a document that's being e-mailed to readers who have a wide variety of computers/printers? We're not allowed to use pdf or any other imaging program [for bureaucratic reasons].

I know how to insert page breaks; unfortunately, these are often 150-200 page documents that aren't finalized until 15 minutes before they have to be sent, so that isn't practical.

Is there any combination of settings that will keep the pagination from shifting a bit [or a lot] when the document is opened and printed on different computers?

[BAM]

Hi Sarah,

Don't use manual page breaks. <img src=/S/grin.gif border=0 alt=grin width=15 height=15>

Instead use the pagination options found under Format/Paragraph and the Line and Page Breaks tab.

If you don't already, start using styles and formatted space between paragraphs rather than an empty paragraph mark.

In a style you can add the "Keep with next" format to your Heading paragraphs that need to stay with the following paragraph. This way if the paragraph moves to the next page the Heading will follow. The built-in Heading Styles 1-4 already include this paragraph format.

It's also important that you use formatted space between the paragraphs. All you have to do is add it to your Styles. This way that the paragraph that follows your Heading actually holds text instead of an empty paragraph. Otherwise you end up with your Heading and a blank line at the bottom of the page.

For those paragraphs that need to stay together on the same page, use the "Keep lines together" format.

So if all Headings and the following paragraph need to always stay on the same page then:

- For your Headings, use a style with the "Keep with next property"
- For the paragraph that follows, create a type of Body Text style and include "Keep lines" together
- For additional paragraphs, create a type of Body Text2 style based on the your Body Text style, but remove the "Keep lines together format"
- Then for your Heading style set the "Style for the following paragraph" as your Body Text style.
- For your Body Text style set Body Text2 style as the "Style for the following paragraph"

[jscher2000]

I'm always surprised when I send out a document in my default typeface (Century Schoolbook) for other people to print, sign, and return, and I get stuff in Times New Roman and Bookman. What am I doing wrong?

Well, the first thing is, whenever I rely on my definition of Normal style, it is possible that someone else's definition of Normal will override mine. So step 1 in avoiding this would be to not use the built-in styles, but to use styles that you uniquely define in the document. Step 2 would be to think in terms of the lowest common denominator. Everyone has Times New Roman and Arial, every printer probably can tolerate header and footer margins as small as half an inch. Use creative fonts and slim margins, though, and for sure there will be problems somewhere. Hope this helps.

[Rajesh]

Word documents by default aren't "portable". If you do not want the default fonts to change or get substituted, you must embed the fonts in the document. Word supports embedding only TrueType fonts, so for portability, use only Truetype fonts. I am not sure whether font embedding is supported in Word 97 but it is in Word 2000 for sure.

Embedding can be done by going to Tools|Options|Save and checking the "Embed Truetype Fonts" checkbox. Do not try embed characters in use only as it sometimes causes Word or the machine to hang.

Embedding makes the files larger than normal. So be careful you don't use Arial Unicode if it is loaded in your machine. The font alone will take up 23MB! With WOrd 97 you won't have to bother, because it does not support Unicode at all.

[Rajesh]

By stable pagination, I suppose you mean that the page and line endings should not vary. If that is a correct understanding, the real complexity will come in when you have "floats" -- pictures and tables placed in text boxes or frames -- interspersed with the text.

Unfortunately, I use Word 2000 and hence cannot tell you if all the tips below are usable in Word 97.

Position floats with reference to margins and "lock anchor" of any text box or frame to a paragraph which you are sure will remain on the same page, even on a lower or higher resolution printer. Choose a small para somewhere in the middle of the page to anchor the float. For this, you have to keep "view object anchors" on (in the Tools|Options|View dialog box). Don't use long paragraphs (in relation to page size). This reduces flexibility in anchoring floats, and often pushes several lines to an earlier or later page leaving a lot of white space.

Finally, in Tools|Options|Compatibility, search for an item called "Use Printer Metrics to lay out document" and see that this item is "unchecked". What his means is that the computer looks at the default printer's capabilities and resolution to lay out the document, so if the printer attached to the amchine is different, the pages may lay out differently, which is what you don't want.

[BAM]

Hi jscher,

The only way Styles in the document can "automatically" change is if in Tools/Templates and Add-Ins you have "Automatically update document styles" tuned on.

Otherwise the recipient would need to intervene in some manner such as, manually change them, use a macro, Organizer, turn on Automatically update, etc to modify your styles.

Recently there has been a pretty lengthy debate on this taking place in the MS newsgroups. If interested, here is a link to Google that you can use to review the discussion: <A target="_blank" HREF=http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&safe=off&th=acc45e6994ae322d,37&start =20>AutoText and user.dot (part II)</A>. The entire thread is about 37 posts, but the above link should place you pretty close to the relevant information.

For those that want to know more about how styles actually function and the misconceptions behind them it's worth the read.
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Cheers! <img src=/S/smile.gif border=0 alt=smile width=15 height=15>

[vswearingen]

Sarah,

Follow BAM's suggestions in this thread. This is as close as you will get.

Your "bureaucrats" need to know that Word is not a static document display program, but rather a dynamic "word processing" program. In my industry, very often lawyers want the recipient(s) of e-mailed document(s) to see exactly what they see when printed out at our offices. This is not possible because there are too many variables involved, as mentioned above, varieties of printers, typeface substitution, etc. Embedding fonts is an option, but the files will be very large and pagination still cannot be guaranteed because printers have different "printable areas" and Word will reformat documents to fit them.

The ONLY way to GUARANTEE exact pagination is to use a "sizable" static image such as PDF or TIF.

[Gary Frieder]

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by Gary Frieder on 29-Jul-01 04:56.</FONT></P>Hi BAM,

Thanks for the link - that is a great discussion.

Coincidentally I've just stumbled upon an unexpected Word behavior, that appears to contradict the idea that a document's styles collection cannot be added to without use of automatically update, use of Organizer, adding styles etc.

I'll post this as a separate thread but would welcome your views on this.

* * * * * *
... an hour later and I've worked out the unexpected behavior; this was just something about Word I didn't understand properly before - that thread was really helpful. Now the only thing I'm left pondering is: why does Dave Rado's FindStylesReallyInUse macro work for both custom and built-in styles, while mine chokes on built-in styles? - but that's a topic for a different thread <img src=/S/smile.gif border=0 alt=smile width=15 height=15>

Gary

[Sarah]

Thanks, everyone! Now that I can be sure there's no way to do it, I can stop trying. <grin>

The tips will come in useful in other contexts, too. BAM, I've been using Styles, and agree that they're the only way to go; I have been using formatted space after the headers instead of a blank paragraph, but didn't know how to automatically avoid widow/orphaned headers - that will be a huge help!

The "keep lines together" would work if I had time to decide which paragraphs to connect, but I don't. Ah, well, maybe I can use that for a stabilized version that goes out the day after the deadline.

I'll have to play with Page Break Before to see how useful it is. I can set up a text style with "Page break before", and changing one paragraph's style would theoretically be as fast as inserting a manual break. Have to see if I'm accruing too many specialty styles to be practical, and if the other people here can understand the method. Sounds encouraging, though.

vswearingen, it's probably a lost cause to convince TPTB that pdf is the way to go. They've stopped demanding that I convert pdf documents back to Word, but it's because they've accepted that I won't do it, not that I can't do it.

Thanks again, all!

[Sarah]

In the meantime, I'm preserving the original pagination in Word documents I receive from others by opening them directly into Acrobat and saving as a pdf file; then I can work on the Word version to my heart's content. So far it seems to work, but have I just been lucky?