Hello,

I have created an index using the entries thanks to the "References" menu. For some entries, I used the "Subentry" option and when inserting the index, I used the "Run-in" type instead of the default "Indented" type.

The subentries in my index are shown after each main entry, after the ": " characters. My document is in French, so ": " (i.e. colon, space) must be replaced by " : " (space, colon, space).

Is there a way to force Word to use my language punctuation?

My index currently looks like this:

accélération, 7, 20


distance, 8, 10; Terre-Lune, 17; Terre-Soleil, 19
position, 14, 23
temps: chronologie, 12, 24; météorologie, 15, 21
vitesse: de la lumière, 4, 12 ; du son, 2, 17

What I want it to look like (see colons and semi-colons):

accélération, 7, 20
distance, 8, 10 ; Terre-Lune, 17 ; Terre-Soleil, 19
position, 14, 23
temps : chronologie, 12, 24 ; météorologie, 15, 21
vitesse : de la lumière, 4, 12 ; du son, 17

Thanks in advance !

You need to apply the appropriate separator switch and/or language switch to your INDEX field. See: https://support.office.com/en-us/art...7-743da1635d9e

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

My INDEX field already use the \z switch with language code 1036 (i.e. French), that's why it is mysterious to me. I couldn't see any difference in my index with or without the language switch, but it is probably unnoticeable.

Here is what my index field currently looks like :
{INDEX \r \z "1036"}

Maybe I can replace the ": " manually thanks to fields, just like the \d \e \g \k or \l switches, but I couldn't find one for subentries.

Apart from my language, how does an English-speaking user do to change the default ": " mark if it is not to their liking?

Manually editing the field display is fairly pointless, as Word will re-set it immediately anything causes the field to refresh (e.g. printing, or print preview).

It appears the behaviour you're seeing is the result of using the \r switch. As documented in the link I gave you:
Thus, the behaviour is by design and there appears no way to change it.

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

French typography, for whatever reason, likes to scatter thin spaces around when it runs across punctuation; see http://unicode.org/udhr/n/notes_fra.html for an overview. I'm fairly sure I've seen Word applying this convention in body text when the language is set to French, but I've never had to create an index there. Would setting language=French in the style for the index output help?

The OP has already done that via the \z "1036" witch in the field. The \r switch specs I quoted don't seem to contemplate any language subtleties.

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

Hm. I'm getting the same results as OP. When I type in a paragraph styled with French as the language, Word automagically injects a finespace before the colon. I set up index entries inside these French-language paragraphs, set the index language to French, use the \r option to run sub-entries into the same line … and even if I set the Index 1 style to French, no sign of the required finespace before a colon.

An oversight, perhaps?

Perhaps, but it's performing exactly as specified.

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

Sorry to harp on it, but I'd suggest that while the index field is behaving as specified the style for the index output is letting the side down; and doesn't match the behaviour of styles for body text with similar settings. To put it another way – we're all right, but nobody wins :-}

Since it seems to be an issue, I'd suggest raising it via http://word.uservoice.com/

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