index entries & sub entries in Word 2007

[Sharon Kay]

I'm getting a weirdness in an index, and I'd like to fix it at the source
rather than hand-edit the finished index.
Problem: Does not always group sub-entries together.
E.g., I have as expected entires that look like
boxes
cardboard
plastic
wood
But I also have entries that are more like
bottles
glass
bottles
plastic
bottles
porcelain

I can hand-edit the index every time it is run, but (a) that is a pain, and
(b) I'll be handing this doc off to my clients, who will need to be able to
update it and re-run the index. Any ideas?

 

[Charles W Davis]

The index works in my Word 2007. I suggest that you may have some extraneous
blanks in the main entry for 'bottles' 'bottles ' 'bottles '

 

[Sharon Kay]

That was my first thought too, but I've examined the fields and there are no
differences. In fact, in some of the cases I was generating several
sub-entries in a single Mark Index Entry dialog box without changing the
main entry -- still getting multiple main entries.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I had this problem in an index years ago and ended up throwing up my hands
and just fixing it manually when the document was complete (after unlinking
the index), but if it occurred today, I would treat the document as corrupt;
see http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/CorruptDoc.htm