-right indent?-

[markbh]

Hello,

Maybe somebody can clarify this for me. If I am working on a text document several pages long, and I place the cursor at the beginning of the first line on, say, the second page, and I hit Enter, the last line on the first page will indent several spaces or more from the right-hand side of the text. If I hit Enter again, the first line will drop down a line which is really what I wanted to do in the first place. Why does this indenting happen? And how can I avoid it?

Many thanks

[macropod]

If you're using justified paragraph formatting,the last line before you pressed the Enter key will revert to left-aligned, which is quite normal. The 'indenting' of the text is nothing more than what you'd see if you'd been using a left-alinged paragraph.

The real issue, though, is why you're pressing the Enter key in the first place - you should only be doing that (once) when you're intentionally creating a new paragraph.

[markbh]

What I am actually trying to do is to move the text down two lines in order to put a page number at the top of the page. I just assumed Enter was the way to do this - this is how I move text down a line or more anywhere else on the page. If there is a better way to do this, please let me know.

Also, why does the formatting revert to left-aligned when everything I have written up to that point has been justified and I have given no indication in the text that I want anything left-aligned? And as far as pressing Enter, all I can say is that when I hit Enter once when the cursor is at the beginning of the first line of a page, the second page of a three page document, for example, nothing happens to that line - it just sits there. I have to press Enter twice to get the line to move down a line. Should Word do this?

Thanks

[macropod]

The correct way to add page numbering is to insert a PAGE field in the document header or footer. Doing things the way you are makes the document a nightmare for any further editing.

The only line that becomes left-aligned is the last line. That is normal behaviour when you end a paragraph, which is exactly what pressing the Enter key does. Look at any book with justified text - the last line in each paargraph doesn't stretch all the way across. In all probability, the first time you press Enter, the paragraph break is being added to the end of the previous line - which is on the previous page. That's why nothing moves on the new page the first time.