word style not retaining
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Word style not retaining settings

resolvedResolved · High Priority · Version 2010

Yvonne has attended:
Word Advanced course

Word style not retaining settings

Hi

The bulleted style I use regularly is not retaining its indent setting and I can see no logical reason why.

The style has a 0cm indent so that the bullet (standard black blob) appears at the margin, and then has a hanging indent of 0.63cm.

Generally this works fine.
However, on a fairly regular basis, this style "changes" to become indented by 0.63cm from the margin as well as the hanging indent of another 0.63cm.

I can update the style to revert the indent to 0cm and save that back to the template the document is based on, but it doesn't seem to stop it changing at will.

Any ideas? We are about to start working on corporate-wide templates which may include this style, so would be good to know how to stop this from happening.

Many thanks
Yvonne

RE: Word style not retaining settings

Hi Yvonne,

Indenting bullets can be fiddly!

I find that indenting for bullets works better if it is changed using the multilevel list feature not paragraph spacing/indents.

Please can I check that you've clicked on the 3rd Bullet point button 1 a i on the Home tab, clicked on define new multilevel list and set the indenting there?

Have you then saved a new style/updated a style with that bullet point?

Save new Styles
1) Click on the bullet you've just set
2) Click on the Styles panel on the Home tab
3) Click create a style and name it Bullets

You may have completed the above steps already. If this is the case it's something completely different. Let me know if that's the case.

Kind regards

Richard Bailey
Microsoft Certified Trainer

Best STL - https://www.stl-training.co.uk
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RE: Word style not retaining settings

Hi Richard

Thanks for your reply.

Unfortunately that isn't the answer as the bullet is part of a dedicated Style called Bullet which is the thing that keeps changing its settings randomly. If it did it every time it would be better.....!

Any idea?

Yvonne

RE: Word style not retaining settings

Hi Richard

I've just re-read and tried your option but using a slightly different final step. Can you see any reason why the method below would have any issues, or should it work the same way as your instructions?

1) Applied my current Bullet 1 style
2) Clicked on the Multilevel List toolbar button, chose Define new multilevel list, chose a bulleted “numbering” style and applied the indent.
3) However, before clicking OK I chose LINK LEVEL TO STYLE and chose my Bullet 1 style from there, then clicked OK.

Obviously until it "goes wrong again" I won't know if what I've done has worked as well as your solution, but I would much appreciate your guidance on this.

Many thanks
Yvonne

RE: Word style not retaining settings

Hi Yvonne,

Thank you for trying the steps I mentioned.
A linked style is an unusual type of style

You have Paragraph (only) Styles, Character (only) styles and then Linked Styles which do either a Paragraph or Character.

Lets see if the fix you've made works.

I think the issue might be around how the Default document Template (Normal.DOTM) loads into Word on your system.

You are making changes to the style 'Bullets' which already exists in the Normal template.

If your Normal template (which connects to your Roaming Profile as you log in) is being reset then you will loose the changes you've made to your bullet style

https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/Change-the-Normal-template-Normal-dotm-06de294b-d216-47f6-ab77-ccb5166f98ea

DO you think that might be the issue?


Kind regards

Richard Bailey
Microsoft Certified Trainer

Best STL - https://www.stl-training.co.uk
98%+ recommend us

London's leader with UK wide delivery in Microsoft Office training and management training to global brands, FTSE 100, SME's and the public sector

RE: Word style not retaining settings

Hi Richard

Thanks for the quick response.

No the "Bullet 1" and "Bullet 2" styles I use were created manually from scratch and have nothing to do with any inbuilt Word styles. The only inbuilt styles I ever use and "mess with" is Normal (upon which most other styles are then based), and then the standard Heading styles.

I recall in a previous role many moons ago (possibly around the time of the first iteration of the ribbon interface), that the housestyle we used linked all the numbered Heading styles using that "link to.." method in the multi-level dialog box, which is why I used it here.

Otherwise, I will wait with interest to see if the indent issue returns now that I've used your method of linking the bullet to the style.

Many thanks for shedding more light on the issue for me.
Regards
Yvonne

 

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