Modify Style Dialog...for global changes

When you display the Modify Style dialog, it looks like you’re just controlling font-related information. You might ask, “So what’s the big deal?” The big deal is the Format button, which gives you access to all sorts of other dialogs that let you control every aspect of a given style. The picture below is just a preview of posts to come in that we will be going through each of the Format options…we have a long way to go.

We’ll start today with Properties on the Modify Style dialog.

Name

The name of the style. If you try to create a new style and you get an error message saying the name already exist, display all styles, find the style, and alter it to make it your own.

Style type

The type of style.  Most likely, you’ll be using paragraph and character styles.

• A paragraph style applies to an entire paragraph.
• A character style applies only to selected text.

When you display the Styles (or Styles and Formatting) pane, Word gives you a hint on the style type by adding a symbol to the right of the style name. 

• A paragraph mark (¶) is the symbol for for a paragraph style.
• An a (underlined, lower cased) is the symbol for a character style.

When you add a new style, you need to understand the difference between the types of styles so that you pick the right type for the style you are adding.

Style based on

The style from which the current style inherits its characteristics. For example, the font for your style is defaulting to 12 points, red, and italic. Your new style is doing so because it is inheriting those characteristics from the based on style.

The based on style is just a starting point. The changes you make for this style make it unique in your list of style. However, if you make changes to the based on style, the current style can change because it inherits change made to the based on style.

When you create a new style, you might want to pick (no style) from the drop-down list. You have to define every aspect of the style; however, it will not change when you make other changes to styles.

Frequently, the base style is Normal. Normal is the lowest level body text style and the default style when you open a new Word document. I frequently change these based on styles because you can make a change to the Normal style that cascades through every style in the pane when you meant to make one small change for one style.

This effect is referred to as cascading…which should make you think of a cascading style sheet...yep, you just got high tech...when you understand how the style sheets in Word inherit, you understand cascading. And cascading is cascading is cascading wherever you see or use it.

Style for following paragraph

This field will save you lots and lots of time and clicking. When you are typing along and you press the Enter key, the style that is in this field is the style that Word applies to your next paragraph.

Here’s how you can use that piece of information. In the Styles (or Styles and Formatting) pane, right-click a Heading style, and then click Modify. The Modify Style dialog appears. If you haven’t altered anything, the paragraph style will be Normal. Click the drop-down arrow. You can make the following paragraph style anything you want it to be. When I set up a book template, one of the first things I do is change all of the Normal paragraph style to Body Text. When I apply a Heading style and I press Enter, the next style that appears is Body Text. I don’t have to pick anything. I can just keep typing because I’ve told Word to always give me a Body Text style when I press Enter after a Heading style.

Next Post

We’ll tackle Formatting next.

Stop Document Bloat

Another habit that contributes to document bloat is empty returns…blank lines with no text. When you reach the end of a paragraph, do you hit Enter twice to create space between paragraphs? If yes, you’re creating empty returns…and bloating your document. So what are you suppose to do? Use body text styles.

I’ve talked about styles before when I addressed what you need to do to generate an electronic table of contents. You need to apply heading styles to be able to use this electronic feature. What I didn’t explain at the time is there are lots of other styles that you can apply to text. When you begin, applying styles is going to seem silly. The big payoff comes when:
--You have to make a change, because you change the style rather than individual paragraphs
--You complete your document because you’ll have a smaller document

The first thing you need to be able to do is see styles.

Create a Document

Open a blank Word document, and add several paragraphs of text. It doesn’t matter what the text says. Be sure to press the Enter key only once at the end of each paragraph. You’ll have a solid block of text with no space between paragraphs.

Display the Styles and Formatting Pane

Word 2003: Select Format--Styles and Formatting. The pane appears beside your document.

Word 2007/2010: Select the Home tab, and locate the Styles group. Click the small arrow in the lower right of the group box. Or, hold down Shift+Ctrl+Alt, and then type S. The pane appears beside your document.

Depending on the version and the document, you might have just a few styles or you may have many. At the very least, you should see the following:
Heading 1
Heading 2
Heading 3
Normal

The Normal style is the one you are interested in. By default, all text in a Word document uses a Normal style.

Change the Space Before and After the Normal Style

1. Right click the Normal style, and then select Modify. The Modify Style dialog appears.
2. Click the Format button, and then select Paragraph. The paragraph dialog appears.

3. Locate the Spacing section on the Indents and Spacing tab.
4. In the Before and After fields, enter 6 for 6 points.
5. Click OK on the Paragraph dialog, and then OK on the Modify Style dialog.
6. Inspect the change in your document. You should see 6 points of space between paragraphs.
7. Repeat these steps, entering 12 for 12 points in the Before and After fields.
8. Inspect the change in your document. You should see 12 points of space between paragraphs.

Be sure to notice that the change occurs in every paragraph where you have the Normal style applied. When you have long documents, being able to change the style and have the change apply to every place where the style occurs can be a real advantage.

If you stopped to look at the screens along the way, you’re sure to have noticed that there are lots of changes you can make. Upcoming posts will cover most if not all of the possibilities for changing and using styles.

Other Types of Styles

Sorry for the break. Like almost everybody I know in Florida, I'm having sinus issues. But it's time to get started again. Let's see, where was I...heading styles.

I've only spoken about heading styles so far. While looking for the heading styles, you should have noticed there are several other styles in any lists that you display. These styles are used to format text to present it in a certain fashion. That is, a style has a preselected font (type face), font size, spacing before and after the paragraph, and any number of other attributes like being indented from a margin. You need to experiment with these styles to learn to use them.

Grand Experiment
1. Open Word and the Blank document template appears automatically.
2. Type a few short paragraphs.
3. Open the list of styles. (See earlier posts for styles.)
4. Notice that the Normal style is selected automatically.
5. Click in a paragraph and pick another style. For example, click the paragraph style Quote or Intense Quote. The presentation of the paragraph changes based on your style selection.

Style lists can contain a number of different types of styles. In Word 2010, the Blank document template style list is limited to two types: paragraph style and character style. Notice that a few in the list below are a combination of both.

Understanding that a paragraph style changes a paragraph and a character style changes just a few selected words in a paragraph is a distinction that you need to internalize.

Another Grand Experiment
1. In a different paragraph, use your cursor to select a few words.
2. Click the Strong character style. Word applies bold to the selected text.

Now comes the interesting part for a genealogist. While the use of the paragraph styles can save you lots of button pressing to format text, the character styles are downright convenient. Here's how...

I like to format all of my family names as bold in small caps so that they stand out in running text. I format my place names as bold and italic. I don't want to make all of these changes each time I add a family name or place name to my document. So, I add the character styles Name and Place. When I add a name to my document, I use my cursor to select the text and apply Name or Place depending on the name. Word completes the formatting for me.

This post is getting long and I've thrown out a lot of ideas for you to process. So I'm going to stop here for tonight. In my next post, I'll give you the exact steps for creating the Name and Place styles.

Styles are a huge topic so we're going to be talking about them for awhile. However, there is one item for note left for this post. Word 2003 users get a complete list of styles automatically. Word 2007 and 2010 users have to hunt for them.

Displaying All Styles in Word 2007 or 2010
1. Look at the bottom of the Styles pane. (See graphic above.)
2. Click the Options... link. The Style Pane Options dialog appears.
3. In the Select styles to show box, select All styles from the drop-down list.
4. Click OK, and then look at your styles list. You'll find many more pre-defined styles.