How can I give a Title to a table?

[Max]

I want to place a title on the line preceding the table, but I want it to
stay and look "attached" to the table like a caption. The way it is, the
Title is on a separate line, and when I can't close up the space between the
title and the table. The title looks like it "belongs" to the preceding
paragraph, and not to the table that it is supposed to.

TIA, Max

 

[Luc]

Max,
Most probably you have applied "Space After" in the paragraph preceeding
your table. Put your cursor in the offending paragraph and press Ctrl+Q.
That should put the space after at 0pt.
Luc

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Or there is Space Before in the table's heading row.

 

[Max]

Hmm, I must be doing something wrong. I put the cursor in the center of the
words, hit Ctrl+Q, and my title was left-justified, lol. Then I tried
"highlighting" the title in question, hit Ctrl+Q and the same thing happened.
Next, I wanted to verify the paragraph formatting; it is indeed already set
at 0 points, and single spaced. Just to make sure, I re-formatted both the
preceding paragraph, the empty line following, and the next line with the
title, to zero points and single spacing.

Oddly enough, I have another table inserted, a few lines further ahead, and
that appears as I want it to. I don't believe I did anything differently for
the second table. Frustrating, this is.

Now what?

Thanks again, Max

 

[Max]

I even went back and made sure that the Widow/Orphan control was checked.
There is no space before or after any of the items, except the one blank
space (actually it's a blank line I used the 'enter/return' key to create)
after the paragraph & before the title line, because that one extra space
gives the appearance that the title belongs more to the table that follows
it, rather than the paragraph preceding it.

It's not the end of the world to have it the way it is, I am just a bit
fussy when it comes to how I want my work to be perceived. It bugs me that I
can't do what I want, and bugs me even more that it is inconsistent with the
same concept further on in the same document. It tends to make people think
that I don't know what I'm doing when it comes to word processing, tsk. Like
I said, not the end of the world, but it goes against the image I want to
project.

Thanks again, Max

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

You need to have a specific Table Title style, and it needs to have Space
Before (*don't* use an extra paragraph to create this space), and it needs
to be formatted as "Keep with next" so it will stay with the table. If the
table headings are set to Bottom alignment, especially if the heading row is
set to an Exact height, and/or if the Table Heading style has some Space
Before, then these could all contribute to extra space between the table and
its title.

 

[Ken]

Another approach that I use in the same situation is to take the top row,
merge all of the cells within the row, make the left, right, and top borders
invisible and use that as the title row, which guarantees that the title
remains attached. The only possible downside is that if your table breaks
across pages and you want the heading row to repeat, you will have to select
the two top rows (the title row and the column header row), meaning that the
title row will repeate on each new page as well.

 

[Max]

Here's something I just thought to check. I went into the document and
clicked on "Show/Hide". Much to my surprise, the two tables show different
formatting, but I don't know how to fix it. The first table shows the
"Show/Hide" paragraph symbols at the beginning of each line of the table,
where the second table does not. Wonder why that is? I am pretty sure I
used the same keystrokes when filling in the info in the cells. It's just
frustrating.

--Max

 

[Max]

Thanks again, Suzanne and Ken, but this is still puzzling me. I have checked
the formatting to be sure that it is *Keep with next*. But how do I format
it as a formalized Table Title Style with Space Before and Bottom Alignment?
Is that part of Table Properties?

--Max

 

[Steven Marzuola (remove wax and invalid for reply)]

I want to place a title on the line preceding the table, but I want it to
stay and look "attached" to the table like a caption. The way it is, the
Title is on a separate line, and when I can't close up the space between the
title and the table. The title looks like it "belongs" to the preceding
paragraph, and not to the table that it is supposed to.

I'm a little surprised nobody else mentioned this, but ...

Have you tried formatting the title with the Format / Paragraph option,
"Keep with Next?" I use Word 2000 but that function is so useful I
can't imagine that it has been changed since then.

You would also want to make sure that the paragraph before the title
does not have this formatting.

 

[Max]

Yes. It didn't change the look. Guess I'll just have to live with it. I am
just fed up over what seems to be such a simple concept.

--Max

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Delete the empty paragraphs in the top row and you're home and dry.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Bottom alignment would apply to the table heading row. If you want to create
a Table Title style, you can just format a paragraph the way you want the
style to look (including center alignment, Space Before, KWN, etc.), then
choose Format | Style | New in Word 2000 or earlier, or New Style in the
Styles & Formatting task pane in Word 2002/2003.

 

[Steven Marzuola (remove wax and invalid for reply)]

Yes. It didn't change the look. Guess I'll just have to live with it. I am
just fed up over what seems to be such a simple concept.

I guess I'm confused ... can you post a screenshot somewhere showing
what you mean?

What you want has to be possible, even though it can be frustrating.

From http://word.mvps.org:
"Word rarely misses an opportunity to perplex"

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

If you do post a screen shot, may I suggest that you enable the display of
nonprinting characters and text boundaries? This is very helpful in
troubleshooting a document based on appearance alone.



"Steven Marzuola (remove wax and invalid for reply)"