Tip #88 - Word Styles

100 Computer Tips in 100 Days

Tip #88 - Word Styles

Microsoft has been trying for years to get you to use their built-in styles in Word to make the formatting of your document easy and consistent -- and yet you continue to resist their efforts. In the 2007 and 2010 versions of Microsoft Word, they have taken these styles and splashed them across the Home ribbon, hoping to entice you with them.

 

Styles included in Word

At a very minimum you should notice that there are two major styles, Normal and No Spacing. For those of you who do not like Microsoft’s new spacing defaults of extra spacing added between paragraphs and within paragraphs, select your document and click on the No Spacing style and all of that extra space will be removed. Of course, you’ll have to go back to manually hitting the Enter/Return key twice between paragraphs. 

 

Modify styles dialog box.

Styles can make formatting long documents mindlessly easy. When you are starting a new area of your document all you have to do is click on one of the heading styles (Heading 1, Heading 2, Heading 3, etc.) in the Styles group of the Home tab. The formatting of the paragraph will change to conform to the choices Microsoft has made for that style. These formatting choices include font, color, size, alignment, spacing, pagination, etc. If you like the idea of using styles but don’t like the formats, you can right-click on the style on the ribbon and choose Modify.  Use the Formatting options or click the Format button to access additional options. If you have already formatted your document with styles, all of the paragraphs that use the modified style will change automatically. 

Styles are a real-time saver for long documents. Once you feel comfortable with them you’ll wonder why it took you so long to use them. There are styles in Excel also so look for them there too.

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Happy Computing!

Diane

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