well-placed equation numbers (captions)

[jbp]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Intel

I've been upgraded to Word 2008, and can't use MathType as I used to. The key MathType feature for me was its ability to number equations and place the number properly. Is there any way to get Word to place an equation number (or caption, if you can stand the misnomer) off to the side of the equation where it belongs?

 

[John McGhie]

Probably the easiest way is to drop the equation into a two-cell table. Put
the caption in the other cell.

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Intel

I've been upgraded to Word 2008, and can't use MathType as I used to. The key
MathType feature for me was its ability to number equations and place the
number properly. Is there any way to get Word to place an equation number (or
caption, if you can stand the misnomer) off to the side of the equation where
it belongs?

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[jbp]

Word insists on selecting the entire table to place the caption under (or over) when you try to place it in a empty cell. If I put a dummy character (say a "1") in the right hand cell, I can get a caption in just that cell, but vertical spacing becomes a serious issue.

BTW, now when I try to create a custom caption label, Word crashes and I get to submit a bug report. I submitted 3 in the past ten minutes!

I'd like my equation numbers to be in the proper format for professional technical publications, but can't find a way to do that and keep autonumbering. Is the technical field really so small that MS and MacBU don't address that issue?

I may have to reinstall Word 2004 to finish my dissertation...

 

[John McGhie]

Sorry: I should have told you: You have to click OUTSIDE the table to
insert the caption, otherwise it thinks you want a "Table" caption.

When you have your caption, drag it into the table cell.

You set the vertical spacing by adjusting the properties of the table cell
and the properties of the Caption style.

Go to Table>Properties>Cell and set the Vertical Alignment to "Centre".

Adjust the style to have any indenting you want.

When you have finished, save the combination (without its equation) as an
AutoText, and assign it to a keystroke or toolbar button, so that you can
put one in with a single click when you want one.

Look up "AutoText" and "Customize" in the help to see how to do that.

Microsoft Office 2008 was designed for the home user market. Microsoft
Office 2007 is the one for the Professional/Technical/Academic market.

We are hoping that many of the features of 2007 will find their way into
2010 on the Mac.

Cheers

Word insists on selecting the entire table to place the caption under (or
over) when you try to place it in a empty cell. If I put a dummy character
(say a "1") in the right hand cell, I can get a caption in just that cell, but
vertical spacing becomes a serious issue.

BTW, now when I try to create a custom caption label, Word crashes and I get
to submit a bug report. I submitted 3 in the past ten minutes!

I'd like my equation numbers to be in the proper format for professional
technical publications, but can't find a way to do that and keep
autonumbering. Is the technical field really so small that MS and MacBU don't
address that issue?

I may have to reinstall Word 2004 to finish my dissertation...

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[jbp]

John,

Thanks for the help. I've worked through the solution you suggested, and it worked to place the numbers well. I still struggle with the handcuffs that the caption formatting places on me. MathType spoiled me! I would like my equations to look like:

a^2 + b^2 = c^2 (4.2)

Then be able to reference them by referring to equation 4.2 with no other formatting. All this and retain the auto-numbering... I'm able to get the caption to look good with your suggestions and a custom caption label of "(". But then Word has no option to use _only_ the number in the cross-reference, and the cross-reference in the text comes out as "equation (4.2". There is also no way to do a custom caption label of a space, or no label.

Right now, I'm hovering between going back to Word 2004 so I can continue to use the MathType numbering, or abandoning the autonumbering so I can format properly in Word 2008.

Clive, I thought they had removed Word 2004 when they upgraded me to 2008. Fortunately, they had not, and I still have to option to use both, without any reinstallation.

I still have this irrational hope that Bob Mathews is going to pull a rabbit out of his hat and tell me that his code wizards have found a way to make Word 2008 and MathType play nice...

Thanks,

Boise

 

[jbp]

a^2 + b^2 = c^2 (4.2)

Grrrr. The formatting on that line didn't work like I typed it. My fault for not being familiar with the forum. Equation should be roughly centered, with the equation number right justified. I'll make a pathetic attempt to force formatting by using underbars for spaces:

_____________a^2 + b^2 = c^2________________(4.2)

I'm sure it won't end up perfect, but you'll get a better picture than the last post!

Boise

 

[Bob Mathews]

Sorry, Boise. I'm fresh out of rabbits. Because of Microsoft's
removing VBA from Office 2008, about all we can do in MathType 6 is
add an "Insert Eqn" button to the toolbar. John's suggestions were
good ones, and if I were forced to use Word 2008, that's how I'd do
numbered equations. Of course, VBA's coming back in the next version
of Office, but who wants to wait 2 years?

Glad you have a fallback with Word 2004.

(Your use of the word "irrational" reminded me of a T-shirt I've seen
at math teacher conferences. It shows the square root of 2, and the
caption is "irrational, but well-rounded". So maybe I am that.)

--
Bob Mathews
Director of Training
Design Science, Inc.
bobm at dessci.com
http://www.dessci.com/free.asp?free=news
FREE fully-functional 30-day evaluation of MathType
MathType, WebEQ, MathPlayer, MathFlow, Equation Editor

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Boise:

Sorry, now you need to understand how "Captions" work

First, go into Word>Preferences>View and turn Field Shading to "Always" so
you can see where the little critters are.

Now, do as you have been, create a Caption outside the table, then drag it
into place. But this time, select ONLY the field, which will now be shaded
so you can see it.

When you add your cross-reference, you will find that it will show you only
the number.

If you right-click the field so you can see the field codes, you will see
{ SEQ Equation }. The SEQ field is the counter that increments each time
one appears. The "Equation" is the LABEL that tells the cross reference
generator which SEQ fields to look at.

The cross reference generator will look for a SEQ field with a label of
"Equation", and replicate all of the text of the paragraph (or just the
Label and number if you choose that). However, if the paragraph (the table
cell, in this case) contains ONLY the number, the number is all you will get


Tell Bob Matthews "more effort is required" (Running away now....)

Hope this helps

John,

Thanks for the help. I've worked through the solution you suggested, and it
worked to place the numbers well. I still struggle with the handcuffs that the
caption formatting places on me. MathType spoiled me! I would like my
equations to look like:

a^2 + b^2 = c^2 (4.2)

Then be able to reference them by referring to equation 4.2 with no other
formatting. All this and retain the auto-numbering... I'm able to get the
caption to look good with your suggestions and a custom caption label of "(".
But then Word has no option to use _only_ the number in the cross-reference,
and the cross-reference in the text comes out as "equation (4.2". There is
also no way to do a custom caption label of a space, or no label.

Right now, I'm hovering between going back to Word 2004 so I can continue to
use the MathType numbering, or abandoning the autonumbering so I can format
properly in Word 2008.

Clive, I thought they had removed Word 2004 when they upgraded me to 2008.
Fortunately, they had not, and I still have to option to use both, without any
reinstallation.

I still have this irrational hope that Bob Mathews is going to pull a rabbit
out of his hat and tell me that his code wizards have found a way to make Word
2008 and MathType play nice...

Thanks,

Boise

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Bob Mathews]

Tell Bob Matthews "more effort is required" (Running away
now....)

Yeah, I've got your effort right here.

*That's* no knife. THIS is a knife. (I know you know the quote.)

Bob

 

[jbp]

Hi Boise:

Sorry, now you need to understand how "Captions" work

Don't apologize! There's a lot I need to understand!

First, go into Word>Preferences>View and turn Field Shading to "Always" so
you can see where the little critters are.

Now, do as you have been, create a Caption outside the table, then drag it
into place. But this time, select ONLY the field, which will now be shaded
so you can see it.

When you add your cross-reference, you will find that it will show you only
the number.

If you right-click the field so you can see the field codes, you will see
{ SEQ Equation }. The SEQ field is the counter that increments each time
one appears. The "Equation" is the LABEL that tells the cross reference
generator which SEQ fields to look at.

The cross reference generator will look for a SEQ field with a label of
"Equation", and replicate all of the text of the paragraph (or just the
Label and number if you choose that). However, if the paragraph (the table
cell, in this case) contains ONLY the number, the number is all you will get

Aha! Nothing like understanding how it really works! That makes gaming the system much easier. Ok, so now I have a 4-cell table with:

1: equation
2: (
3: 4.2 (or { SEQ Equation })
4: )

Gotcha. I've fiddled with that for the past 20 minutes or so, and it works great. You're a genius! A little cumbersome to implement, but I had begun to believe that there wasn't _any_ solution.

Funny, I started word processing with Paperclip on my Atari 800XL. And here I am back to embedded commands to make sense of Word...

Tell Bob Matthews "more effort is required" (Running away now....)

Ouch! I see Bob already responded to that, and yes, I got the reference. I had two interns here for the summer, and spent 10 weeks watching their blank stares as reference after reference blew by them and proved just how old I am. And I'm only 41...

Thanks again. I'm sure I'll crash up against some other issues that I may need help with in the transition. Are there any specific things I should do to transition my dissertation from 2004 to 2008 gracefully?

Boise

 

[Phillip Jones]

Yeah, I've got your effort right here.

*That's* no knife. THIS is a knife. (I know you know the quote.)

Bob

I may mangle the spell, But is the quote:

Ea to Brut-a or etu Brutus?
--
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616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
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If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
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<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>

 

[Bob Mathews]

I may mangle the spell, But is the quote:

Ea to Brut-a or etu Brutus?

Phillip, I'll eat just about anything except a Vegemite sandwich.
There's no telling what that Aussie McGhie will offer me.

Bob

 

[Bob Mathews]

Ouch! I see Bob already responded to that, and yes, I got the
reference.

It's just a friendly spar between a couple of cyber friends half a
world apart.

I owed him one.

Bob

 

[John McGhie]

Eewww.....

Yes, we know the quote rather well down here

Although, these days we tend to say "That's no tax problem. THIS is a tax
problem!"

Cheers

Yeah, I've got your effort right here.

*That's* no knife. THIS is a knife. (I know you know the quote.)

Bob

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Boise:

Aha! Nothing like understanding how it really works! That makes gaming the
system much easier.

Yes That's the spirit

Ok, so now I have a 4-cell table with:

1: equation
2: (
3: 4.2 (or { SEQ Equation })
4: )
Perfect!

Are there any specific things I should do to
transition my dissertation from 2004 to 2008 gracefully?

Yes.

Leave it in 2004

Or: You're a smart guy, that's why you're writing a dissertation. Write
yourself a business case to justify the transition from 2004 to 2008.

If you ever manage to get the right hand column to be longer than the
left-hand column, go for it.

For long, complex documents, I just can't make a business case to go to Word
2008. And I don't think anyone else can, either

Entourage has some useful improvements. As far as I can tell, the other
three products are all downgrades!

The new XML file format is much more robust, but the changes to the Office
file writing software that would also make it more reliable have not yet
happened, on the Mac.

If you are a System Administrator with thousands of Macs, the new file
format occupies very considerably less disk space, and that has to be a
major benefit. For a home user doing school projects, maybe the new
graphics are attractive, but I have never seen anyone using them in the
business or academic fields. Again, for home users, maybe the new template
themes are attractive, but in business they are an assault on the eyeballs
and thus are banned.

Sorry: I use Word 2008 for answering questions in here. I use 2004, 2003,
and 2007 for everything else

Cheers

--

Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[jbp]

Are there any specific things I should do to

Yes.

Leave it in 2004

Wow. Thanks for the brutal honesty!

For long, complex documents, I just can't make a business case to go to Word
2008. And I don't think anyone else can, either
....

Sorry: I use Word 2008 for answering questions in here. I use 2004, 2003,
and 2007 for everything else

Looks like I'll stick with both versions installed until 2010(?) catches up to 2007. Boy, does that make for a funny sentence...

Thanks, John. I really appreciate the help and tutorial.

Boise