I'm trying to understand section breaks a little better, and learn if there is a better way to approach things.

I have Word 2013 document that has 5 sections to it. They all use next page section breaks.

Section 1 is the Cover Page
Section 2 is the TOC
Sections 3, 4, and 5 are the 'body' of the report.

Sections 1 and 2 are in portrait, and have specific header/footer content info for them

Sections 3 and 5 are also set for portrait. However, section 4 is set for landscape.



Now, since section 4 is not always needed, I have found that when the user deletes/remove that information when pressing 'delete' at the end of section 3, all of section 3 is changed from portrait to landscape. Is that the normal word behavior? Or can you possible delete a section break (ie, break 4) and still keep the orientation of the section above it was is?

Similarly, if the user presses delete at the end of section 4, since section 5 is portrait, then section 4 becomes portrait as well.

The section definition for any section is contained in the section mark at the end of the section, not the beginning. The last paragraph mark in a document is also the last section mark. So in a 5-section document when you delete the third section mark, you delete the section definition for section 3 and it becomes a part of section 4.

The section definition includes headers and footers, margins and orientation.

Sections / Headers and Footers in Microsoft Word 2007-2013

Thanks for the help and better clarification.

So not much I can really do except to try and get my staff to fix the pagination if they remove section 4 from the document. Some are good at see it and fixing, and others send/email their reports in without printing or check it, which of course then makes the report extra pages and screws up the TOC