Alternating sides for paragraph numbering within a book's pages.

T

Thomas

I am trying to write a legal dissertation, which requires that I display
paragraph numbers within all main-body text. That task is easy enough to
accomplish, but I would like to display the numbers shown on even-numbered
pages to be on the left margin and those on odd-numbered pages to be on the
right margin (i.e., always to the outside on a book's page). Is this possible
without complicated VB script?
 
S

Suzanne S. Barnhill

That will take care of page numbering, but if the OP wants the paragraph
number in the heading, a StyleRef field (or something like it) will be
required. And if the number is to be in the side margin, then a text box or
frame with a StyleRef field will be required, and even that may not suffice
if there's more than one paragraph on the page.
 
T

Thomas

Thank you both, Suzanne and Stefan. the page setup recommendation is
certainly helpful, and it will satisfy another aspect of my book-writing
formatting ordeal. However, i would like to know more about this StyleRef
field. I finally worked with the Frame (but no StyleRef) and got something to
work. Unfortunately, i must apply a user-defined format, which i will call
Margin-Number (with numbered bullets), to a Normal paragraph to place the
numbering in the margin, which is my goal. That then leaves behind a second
Normal paragraph--at an equal vertical level as the Margin-Number paragraph
sitting in the margin. the Margin-Number formatted paragraph then looks and
acts like a Text Box, but really isn't (it even has an anchor setting at the
beginning of my Normal paragraph). My cumbersome chore from this point on is,
when I want to begin or insert a new paragraph, I must enter two carriage
returns. I then format the first of those two as Margin-Number, then begin my
text on the second Normal paragraph. Thus, through working with the Frame
aspect of this new style and setting it outside of the page margin, it
automatically alternates its location on each succeeding page (i.e., left and
right).

Thomas
 
B

Bear

Thomas:

Let me commend you for your skill and persistence in creating this
application. You're doing pretty much what I would do.

The only "improvement" short of VBA that I can suggest is to assign the
numbering style to a keyboard shortcut and make sure it's defined so that the
next paragraph is Normal (or whaever you're using for your paragraph body
text).

For each new paragraph you press the shortcut (which creates and positions
your number because of the style definition) then press Enter to create the
body paragraph.

I don't think you can make it any simpler.

Bear
 
T

Thomas

Thanks. VBA does not come into the picture...I'm an academic, not a
programmer. ;-) I think i definitely will apply a shortcut to the whole
affair to make it just that much simpler; however, I'm glad to hear I am on
the right track. Thanks again!

Thomas
 
D

David Fisher

As my requirement is similar, but may require VBA I thought I'd keep it in
the same thread.
My wife generate reports for her PhD 20-30 pages long. But her cut and paste
is literally that, Print, cut, and resequence ,I then have to be the one that
has to reassemble everything electronically.

What would help tremendously is to add a box in the margin with a sequential
number for each paragraph (which is double space). and once the resequencing
is done remove those boxes (until the next time).
Any suggestions?
 
D

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

It is not really a good idea to add a new question to an existing thread,
especially one that is a couple of months old!

You can probably achieve what you want by selecting the area of the document
that you want to re-order and then from the Tables menu, select Convert Text
to Table and if the radio button for Paragraphs is checked in the "Separate
text at" section of the dialog, it should convert the text to a one column
table with each paragraph in a separate cell. You could then insert a
column to the left into the cells of which you enter numbers representing
the new paragraph order and then use the Sort facility on the Tables menu to
sort the table by that column. Then delete the column with the numbers and
select the whole table and from the Tables menu, use the Convert Table to
Text option.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP
 
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