TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
I use it all the time and I usually reuse trusted templates. I will just revise them with new fonts, etc. I don't touch the field codes and haven't in years but I think that you're right that the field codes in your example pop up if you toggle field codes on. I just clicked the buttons once I learned to trust that they worked. It was such a relief after coming from a word perfect background when you had to edit the field codes all the time.
I'm using 2016 and Insert Table of Figures is a separate item on the ribbon. If you are using an older version w/o the ribbon interface you'll want to take a little time to learn it instead of learning it when you have a project due. Everything is still there, but they moved things around a lot and recall a lot of cussing when I first switched from menus to the ribbon interface. Now I love it but in the heat of battle it wasn't fun.
-----Original Message-----
From: Monique Semp [mailto:monique -dot- semp -at- earthlink -dot- net]
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2017 4:20 PM
To: Lin Laurie <linlaurie1 -at- hotmail -dot- com>; Tammy Van Boening <tammyvb -at- spectrumwritingllc -dot- com>; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com; lonewriter-discuss -at- mailer -dot- stc -dot- org
Subject: Word's features vs. workaround - (was: Word x-ref question)
I donât recall why I set up the template the way I did. But as I said, it started a long time ago, and likely what I wanted was impossible then. And when I upgraded to newer versions, I just kept doing things as I'd always done them.
For the Table of Contents, I use the standard heading styles and the automated method to produce it. It did what I needed.
For the List of Figures, I used the Table of Contents field (TOC) -- which is the automated way to do it -- and in the dialog box tab for Table of Figures (which pops up when you edit the TOC field code), I set the Caption Label to Figure, selected "Include label and number", selected the print options (show page numbers, right align page numbers, and used the dots as the tab leader). When I toggle the field code, it shows:
{ TOC \h \z \c "Figure" }
So this is the auto-generate way; I don't have to build it by manually putting in all the xrefs.
I haven't used Word much in quite a long while now. So the next time I need it for producing user docs in quantity (vs. small one-off docs for myself), I'll most likely need to upgrade to whatever's current then. And at that point, it seems that I should revisit my template, and likely create a new one. And likely it'll be easier to do things with a more modern version of Word.
-Monique
-----Original Message-----
From: Lin Laurie
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2017 4:08 PM
To: Monique Semp ; Tammy Van Boening ; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com ; lonewriter-discuss -at- mailer -dot- stc -dot- org
Subject: RE: Word x-ref question
I've been talking to Tammy offline because my screenshots don't go through the list server as it doesn't like HTML. But why aren't you using Word's built-in tools that generate a caption for you and you can choose whether the label if "Figure (with or without the colon" or even custom labels) and then you can autogenerate the table of figures like you do the table of contents?
I know that some old timers use the old-fashioned ways to generate things like this when Word has some really nice automated tools that do a lot of the work for you. Out of curiosity, how do you generate a table of contents?
Do you use Heading Styles and then use the automated way to do it or do you do it with field codes?
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+linlaurie1=hotmail -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+linlaurie1=hotmail -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of Monique Semp
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2017 4:02 PM
To: Tammy Van Boening <tammyvb -at- spectrumwritingllc -dot- com>; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com; lonewriter-discuss -at- mailer -dot- stc -dot- org
Subject: Re: Word x-ref question
Hi Tammy,
I'm still on Word 2010 (because I haven't needed Word for a client for a long while, so haven't bothered to update), but the numbering/xref functions don't seem to have changed since 2007, so it's likely still applicable for Word 2016.
I do not use word's numbering for the tables or the captions. It's been so long since I set up my Word templates (originally for Word 2003, and ported to Word 2007 and then 2010), and so long since I used Word for full-featured docs, that I don't recall a lot of why I have things the way they are. But in this case, it's certainly likely that I ran into the problems you're having.
Instead of using Word's numbering, I use sequence numbering via field codes right in the text itself. So if I expand the field codes for the text of Figure Caption-styled paragraph, which of course will contain the figure's caption, here's what it shows:
Figure {Seq Figure \* ARABIC \* MERGEFORMAT}. Title of the figure
IMPORTANT reminder to everyone about showing field codes: To replicate this, don't just type the curly braces and their contents as shown above. You have to insert the field code and make the right selections and add the right modifiers.
Then for every figure caption, I just copy/paste the text from another figure's caption, change the desired text, and select all/update field codes.
For the xrefs, I use Insert > Cross-reference, select Figure for the reference type, select Insert as hyperlink, and choose Insert reference to:
Only label and number. The result is the desired "Figure #", where "#" is the actual number.
The xref is going to use "Figure" for the label no matter what you actually type in the figure's caption, which effectively means that you must use "Figure" in your caption line text. (Otherwise it wouldn't match the xref's
label.)
I do the same process for tables.
This field codes for sequence numbering and the copy/paste of the text seems perhaps non-standard. But it's easy, and after a while it becomes so automatic you won't even think about it. And certainly much better than inserting bookmarks, which bring their own headache.
I'm not sure I got the procedure complete, so if it doesn't work, please ask for clarifications.
HTH,
-Monique
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Visit TechWhirl for the latest on content technology, content strategy and content development | http://techwhirl.com
Looking for articles on Technical Communications? Head over to our online magazine at http://techwhirl.com
Looking for the archived Techwr-l email discussions? Search our public email archives @ http://techwr-l.com/archives
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Visit TechWhirl for the latest on content technology, content strategy and content development | http://techwhirl.com
