Best Method Of Inserting Preformatted Pages

[abraxis]

I'm developing a community newsletter, and have pretty much got down the steps of graphics, text boxes, headers, footers, etc. But I will be inserting my text and graphics in alternating left/right pages in column form. What is the best method, please, for creating these pre-formatted left/right columns and then storing them and inserting them when needed before adding necessary text and graphics. I now have to hand create each page with new columns as I need them. I tried to highlight an entire page, copy and paste it later in the document when needed, but this is clearly not the way to go. Any help in the right direction would be greatly appreciate.

[Stefan Blom]

In Word, you can certainly make use of Building Blocks to quickly insert not only blocks of text, but also text boxes, pictures, and other objects. But it won't be as flexible as you are hoping for, I'm afraid. For example, if you want headers and footers to be inserted along with these objects, you'll have to add a section break to your Building Block. This is going to be difficult to maintain.

Frankly, what you are trying to do is a task for a page layout program rather than for Word.

[abraxis]

I have headers/footers in my original document template, so they will get inserted automatically when I insert new pages. How what is the best way to insert pre-formatted pages with columns laid out? How about if I format left and right handed pages, store them as templates, then open them in another window along with my original document, and cut and paste it into my original. If not, what "building blocks" do you suggest. I'm a fast learner, but do not know which topic in my manual or on-line help to go to. And as for page layout programs, are you talking about full-blown desktop publishing software, or a piece of software just for laying out a page. I appreciate your answers, but they are a little light on specifics. Please elaborate, and thanks for your input.
Abraxis

[Stefan Blom]

Adding "pages" is the difficult part in Word. It would be more accurate to say that you add content which may or may not spill over to a new page. You'd have to add a manual page break or a section break to force a new page.

To re-use content, you can paste it in from a separate document or template, or you can store content in Building Blocks (an extension of AutoText entries in older versions of Word). A Building Block can contain anything that can be cut/copied and pasted in Word.

Preserving section formatting (headers, footers, page setup, newspaper columns) when pasting in content is far from straightforward. For more, see http://word.mvps.org/faqs/formatting...thsections.htm.

If you know what elements should be in your document, you can add them in a single template for easy reuse. A template may consist of several pages if necessary.

I'm not sure if this is sufficiently specific...

[abraxis]

Thank you. That is a very good start. I'll follow the suggestions you gave me and the web page you indicated. I appreciate the feedback.
Jerry Sindler