Character style without specifying a font (e.g. for bold or underl

[themint100]

Hi all,

Is there a way in Word to make a character style that would only apply the
selected formatting (e.g., bold, underline, smallcaps) to the selected text?

Even when I specify that a character style is to be based on (underlying
properties), Word selects a font for the character style.

I'd expect to see a "None" entry in the font list when setting up such a
style (like in FrameMaker).

-g

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Use the Default Paragraph Font for the font setting.

General info:
http://word.mvps.org/faqs/customization/DefParaFont.htm

 

[themint100]

Thanks, Daiya.

Unfortunately, that's not working. I have a character style called 'bold'. I
am trying the following:

1) Right click and choose Modify in the Style list on 'bold'.
2) In the Modify Style dialog:
- name="bold"
- Style type="Character" but is grayed out...I'm assuming this is because
'bold' is a reserved name...that's fine, I just want to define what 'bold'
means
- Style based on is set to "Default Paragraph Font"

In the Formatting section, Times New Roman 10pt is selected, along with the
Bold ("B") icon.

Grrr...

Is the problem trying to use one of Word's reserved names? Seems I should be
able to define what 'bold' means...

-g

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Start with the character style listed as "Default Paragraph Font," but don't
try to modify it. Instead, choose New, then type Bold (or whatever) as your
style name. A character style can contain any formatting that can be defined
in the Font dialog, but it does not have to specify a font or point size if
it is based on the DPF.

 

[themint100]

Hmmm...I can't modify the style 'bold' which is what I really wanted to
do...apparently that one's reserved. I was able to make another
(unfortunately it has a name different than every other template I've ever
built in other systems).

If 'bold' is indeed a reserved character style, why is there a font
specified for something so generic? Can anyone else verify that 'bold' has
Times New Roman assigned and not changeable?

If it's only me, does that indicate some kind of corruption to the template?

-g

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I don't have a built-in character style named Bold in Word 2003. Are you
having this issue in Word 2007?

 

[themint100]

I am using MS Word 2002, SP3

I don't have a built-in character style named Bold in Word 2003. Are you
having this issue in Word 2007?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Then there is no built-in character style named Bold.

 

[themint100]

You're right, and I've sorted out the problem. It's bad UI.

The first problem is that there's no way in the Styles and Formatting pane
to tell if a style is a 'reserved' style. I finally figured out that the only
way to tell is by right-clicking on the style and seeing if I can delete it.
Not very efficient if I have a complex template. There doesn't seem to be a
way to see a canonical list of the reserved styles anywhere (or at least none
that I can see).

The reason I thought my character style 'bold' was reserved was that when
opening the Modify Style dialog for the style, the "Style Type" was grayed
out.

However, the specific problem here is that if you define a character style
with a font inadvertently selected, there is no way to remove the font from
the character style (or at least none that I can see).

<b>The recommended fix:</b> when modifying a character style, there should
be an entry at the top of the font list called (None).

This is *different* from the (underlying properties) specification in the
'Style Based On' pulldown...that specifies whether a dependency between
styles should exist.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I'd vote for that, but it's all the more reason for basing character styles
on Default Paragraph Font.