Finding a Word

[Leonard M. Wapner]

Greetings -

How can I find all instances of a given word, without getting other words in
which the given word is embedded? For example, say I want to find all
occurrences of "the".
How can I avoid getting "mathematics", "theme", etc?

Thanks -

Len

 

[Thomas Ferguson]

You can use the "find" dialogue by pressing Ctrl f. Search for

<white space>the<white space>

To tell it to look for the <white space> click on More Special White
Space in the dialogue box. In the Find slot it will appear as ^wthe^w.

It will not locate any occurrences of the such as, "She said, "the wig is on
the table". The first the in the quote will not be tagged. Also, a The
appearing as the first word of a paragraph will not be tagged.

Tom
MSMVP-DTS

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

In the Find dialog, click More, then check the box for "Find whole words
only."

 

[Greg Maxey]

Edit>Find>More. Check "Find whold words only"

 

[Thomas Ferguson]

The things you don't notice even after using Word for years and years
and.......

Much simpler that the way I was doing it!

Tom
MSMVP-DTS

 

[Klaus Linke]

Greetings -

How can I find all instances of a given word, without getting other words in
which the given word is embedded? For example, say I want to find all
occurrences of "the".
How can I avoid getting "mathematics", "theme", etc?

.... and if you need more control than using "Match whole word only", you
can use wildcard searches:
Check "More > Match wildcards",
Find what: <mathe*> will find all words starting with "mathe" such as
mathematics, mathematical, mathematician.

In the English version, you can also search for "all word forms": Searching
for "is" will then also find "was", "been", "am", ...
This only works with single words as far as I know, and you may need a
macro (for I don't see the option in the Find dialog in my English
Word2003).

Greetings,
Klaus

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Not to mention that, as you point out, your way wouldn't find "the" preceded
or followed by punctuation.

 

[TF]

Tom

In your defence, you could ask the same question that I asked many moons
ago, "What is the purpose of the 'more' button in the F&R dialog?" It isn't
as though the dialog is too large or that the extra options are dangerous:
so why don't they just rearrange the dialog so that it opens up with all the
options present? That would unconfuse about 150 million global users!

Terry Farrell

: The things you don't notice even after using Word for years and years
: and.......
:
: Much simpler that the way I was doing it!
:
: Tom
: MSMVP-DTS
:
: : > In the Find dialog, click More, then check the box for "Find whole words
: > only."
: >
: > --
: > Suzanne S. Barnhill
: > Microsoft MVP (Word)
: > Words into Type
: > Fairhope, Alabama USA
:
: > Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup
: > so
: > all may benefit.
: >
: > : >> Greetings -
: >>
: >> How can I find all instances of a given word, without getting other
words
: > in
: >> which the given word is embedded? For example, say I want to find all
: >> occurrences of "the".
: >> How can I avoid getting "mathematics", "theme", etc?
: >>
: >> Thanks -
: >>
: >> Len
: >>
: >>
: >
:
: