Hi! I've got trouble adjusting the line of my columns.



Previously, the document had separate tables with page breaks. Meaning each page has a table. Then I went to remove all the page breaks and combined all table as one because I want to have header rows. When I did this, the size of the header row is fixed, but, since previously each page had its individual table, the column line could have slightly different widths. They might have been manually adjusted by the previous person since each page had an individual table. Now, when I try to manually adjust the column lines to match the lines of the header row, it will affect the column lines of subsequent parts of the table, because now I'm using Page Break Before instead.

I can't get the column lines to align to the header row without affecting column lines in subsequent pages (Page Break Before applied). Please help, thanks!

If, having joined the tables, you align their left & right borders, you could use the column width dialogue in the table Tools context menu to manually set the widths.

Alternatively, having aligned the left & right borders, you could use the 'distribute columns' tool in the table Tools context menu to make all the columns an even width. If the results widths aren't what you want, you can then click on any of the column borders to drag the columns borders left/right - or you can use the column width dialogue in the table Tools context menu to manually set the widths.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Hi macropod,

Thanks for the reply.

My issue is that after aligning the left and right borders for the table on one page, the left and right borders of the rest of the table automatically moves as well. As such, I can't seem to get all of them to be in line with the header row.

I've tried manually resetting the widths, but it affects the subsequent part of the table, causing the rest of the table to not be in line. :/

That's not surprising, but going through the process I outlined should be sufficient to resolve all the issues.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Hi macropod,

You mean aligning the extreme left and right borders of the table or just the left and right borders for the column that I'm interested in?

When I align the left and right borders for the column to align to the header row, then same column on subsequent pages has its left and right borders moved automatically as well, causing it to be out of line with the header row. When I go to this affected page to align its left and right borders to be in line with the header row, the left and right borders that I've previously adjusted goes out of line with the header row too.

Note, it's a long table with many pages.

Provided you get the left & right extremities of the table aligned, the 'distribute columns' tool will align the column boundaries in-between. You can then drag any column boundary to adjust the widths - or use the column width dialogue box to the same effect. The point is, though, that you have to complete the process; until then columns may be significantly misaligned in different parts of the table.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Hi macropod,

Is there a way to do this without distributing the columns? Cuz I've got a long table that spans over 200 pages. Thanks.

As I have said a couple of times, now, you can adjust the column widths through the column width dialogue in the Table Tools context menu. See under Table Tools>Layout>Properties>Column.

PS: trying to have a single table that spans 200+ pages is ridiculous. You should be using Excel or Access for content like that. Word's performance will be seriously degraded if you ever get that lot into a single table, especially, if the table's 'Automatically resize to fit contents' option is checked.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]