I often find that when I've scanned a document and OCRd it, the style is way out from what I want. I've got an example now where I've ended up with a whole list of styles that aren't normally present on my computer. Only one of them (Normal) do I want to use but I cannot get it to change to Normal. I've got choices like 'body text(2) + 10 pt + bold', but cannot get Normal, even though it's in the (now very long) list. What's going on?

Ordinarily, if you select a Style using the Style Manager and choose 'Delete', anything formatted in the deleted Style reverts to the Normal Style.

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Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

What is Style Manager, other than a third party item?

It's the box at the side of the screen you see when you choose Format|Styles and Formatting.

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Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

OK. Right. So two questions. Why can I not make the whole doc Normal (in this particular doc the other styles seem to inhibit that change), and I am I'm wrong in thinking that a style or styles available in one doc are available to all docs?

Only those styles that are in a document's template are available to all documents based on that template. Some Styles, such as Word's built-in Styles (which includes 'Normal') are always available. Notwithstanding the presence of a Style in the template, that does not ensure the same formatting applies in all documents based on the template - it's quite possible to change the Style's settings for the current document only.

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

Why is it, though, that I cannot make the doc go Normal?

You can. Cut all of the content (Ctrl-A, Ctrl-X), then use Edit|Paste Special > Unformatted Text. All of the content should now be in the Normal Style. That won't remove the unwanted Style definitions, though.

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

No, I meant by just trying to go to Normal without making other changes. It won't let me. It just stays the same (thanks for this tutorial on styles, BTW Paul!)

I'm not sure I'm following. Are you saying you can't select the Normal Style? Or that nothing happens when you do? What happens to the text if you select it and press Ctrl-Spacebar?

If you could attach a document to a post (delete any sensitive data) containing examples of the affected content, I might be able to get a better idea of what the issues are. You can do this via the paperclip symbol on the 'Go Advanced' tab.

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

I didn't know that ctl spacebar formatted to Normal. It did. Now I know! However the attachment shows that if you try to restyle by clicking Normal from the list of styles, it won't change. Why is that?

Attached Files

TESCO.doc (45.5 KB, 10 views)

Refusal to change isn't my experience. I'm assuming that you have one or more paragraphs selected when you are trying to make the change.

The Ctrl-spacebar does not set the style to normal, it removes direct and character-level formatting, and applies the underlying paragraph style.

See Understanding Styles in Microsoft Word and Clean Up Basic Formatting.

OCR makes such a mish-mash of formatting that I usually convert the document to plain text (.txt) and then copy from that file. I then apply styles to achieve my formatting. (This is also true of conversions from another Word Processing program.) Another method that is helpful with copied text from the web is to use AutoFormat (under Format).

It's intriguing that refusal to change is not your experience. If you select the whole document with ctrl A and then click Normal from the list of styles does it go to Normal for you? It won't for me!

Hi cryptogram,

Ctrl-Spacebar ordinarily returns a selection to its underlying Style format, not simply to Normal Style.

I'm not sure why, in your document it's reverting to Normal. I'd have thought the first line in your attachment would revert to Body Text. Be that as it may, you can change the first line's format to Body Text (or whatever else happens to be the first name in the Style definition) , then to whatever other Style (including Normal) you might want. or you could use Ctrl-A, Ctrl-Spacebar to revert all the text to its underlying Style (in this documents case, that seems to be 'Normal') despite what the Styles dialogue initially implies).

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

Yes. And this is with paragraphs in many styles including in tables. It does not include headers or footers or textboxes because those are not in the main document layer.

I just looked at your document and Ctrl-A and selecting the normal style did not work.

I also noticed that Ctrl-Spacebar did set everything to normal style and your Body Text style is formatted to look like some sort of header.