What version of Word do you use? - Janie

What version of Word do you have?  Each is a little different.  Word 2003 is different from Word 2007, and so on.

In Word 2007, if you want to bold a word, all you have to do is put the cursor within the word and hit CTRL+B – you do not have to highlight the word first.  

For example if you want to bold “IMPRESSION”, make sure the cursor is within the word somewhere (not at the very beginning – before the “I” – and not at the very end – after the “N”), but somewhere within the word.  

With Word 2007, that works for just about anything – bold, underline, change case.  As long as the cursor is within the word, the entire word will take on that feature.  

Hope that makes sense.

If you use Word 2003, I would have to look at my old computer to see about macros because I have not used it in a few months, so I cannot remember exactly how it works with Word 2003.  

Can you use autocorrect? - MT

Yes, I can use autocorrect. To bold in the replace/find sm - MTBird

Unfortunately, I am using Word 2003. That features sounds cool though! sm - MTBird

I also use Word 2003 - MT

One more trick you can try - Janie

There is one other thing you can try, but I am not sure if it would be any faster than the Macro that you already set up.

This supposedly works in all versions of Word.  I know it works in 2007, but you will have to try it in Word 2003 to see if it indeed does work and if it is any faster than the Macro.

I guess the only real difference is whether you want to change all the headings at one time when you start or finish the report; or if you prefer to do it as you get to each section.  I tend to get distracted and forget to run macros at the beginning or end.  And in your case with the colon and bold, SR could put in a colon where it does not belong or not put the colon in at all for a heading, and the Macro will miss it or bold something that should not be bolded. 

At any rate, here are the instructions that you can try if you want to change words to bold as you read through the report.

If you are straight typing, you can use the asterisks trick described below  at the beginning and end of a word or phrase that you want bolded.  If you are doing SR, it still works.  Just type the * at the beginning where you want to start bolding and then at the end where you want to stop.  That way you can either bold one word or a phrase, sentence, or even paragraph, just by adding * at the beginning and end. 

Word provides another quick way to make text bold—using asterisks.  If you type asterisks in this manner (directly next to a word or group of words) in Word, the asterisks are automatically removed and the word(s) are shown in bold type.

You can try this yourself by typing *this is bold* (exactly as shown here, including spacing) within Word.  When you type the second asterisk, both asterisks should disappear and the words "this is bold" are shown in bold type.

If this formatting shortcut doesn't work for you, it is because of a setting in Word's AutoFormat feature.

If you are using an older version of Word, follow these steps:

1. Choose AutoCorrect Options from the Tools menu.  Word displays the AutoCorrect dialog box.


2. Make sure the AutoFormat As You Type tab is displayed.


3. Make sure the *Bold* and _Italic_ with Real Formatting check box is selected.


4. Click OK.

The shortcut should now work just fine.

Hope this helps.  Let us know which works better for you.  It may be a trick we can pass along to other MTs struggling with SR.

Good Luck

Oh that is cool! Thanks for sharing. sm - MTBird

That is cool, thanks!! - No message

macros - OldHandAtThis

Properly formatted macro that should work - OldHandAtThis

I hope this macro will format propertly this time, I am using rich text format:

Sub FormatHeader()
    Dim HeaderString, TempString, BookMarkString As String
    Dim Spaces As Boolean: Spaces = False
    Dim L, A As Long

    Selection.MoveUp unit:=wdParagraph, Count:=1, Extend:=wdExtend
    TempString = Trim(UCase(Selection.Text))
    Selection.Delete
        GoSub FontsOff: GoSub CleanString: GoSub FontsOn
    On Error Resume Next
    ActiveDocument.Bookmarks.Add Name:=BookMarkString
    Selection.TypeText Trim(HeaderString) & ":"
        GoSub FontsOff: GoSub CheckRight
            Exit Sub
       
CleanString:
TempString = Application.CleanString(TempString)
L = Len(TempString)
While L > 0
    Char = Mid(TempString, 1, 1): TempString = Mid(TempString, 2, L)

    If Char <> " " Then
        Spaces = False
    End If
   
    If Char = ":" Then
        Char = ""
    ElseIf Char = " " And Spaces = True Then
        Char = "": Spaces = True
    ElseIf Char = " " Then
        Spaces = True
    End If
   
        HeaderString = HeaderString & Char
       
        If Char = ";" Or Char = "." Or Char = "," _
            Or Char = "?" Or Char = "!" Then
            Char = ""
        ElseIf Char = " " Then
            Char = "_"
        End If
            BookMarkString = BookMarkString & Char
            L = L - 1 '
Wend
        Return

FontsOn:
    With Selection
        .Font.Bold = True: .Font.Underline = wdUnderlineSingle
    End With
        Return

FontsOff:
    With Selection
        .Font.Bold = False: .Font.Underline = wdUnderlineNone
    End With
        Return

CheckRight:
    GoSub AsciiText
    While A = 32 Or A = 58
        Selection.Delete: GoSub AsciiText
    Wend
    If A = 32 Then
        Return
    Else: Selection.TypeText "  "
        GoSub FontsOff
    End If
   
    While A = 40 Or A = 147
        Selection.MoveRight: GoSub AsciiText
    Wend
       
If A = 112 Then
    Selection.MoveRight unit:=wdWord, Extend:=wdWord
    TempString = Trim(Selection.Text)
    Selection.Collapse
        If TempString = "pH" Then
            Return
        End If
ElseIf A < 96 Then
        Return
End If
    With Selection
        .Delete: .TypeText Chr(A - 32): .MoveLeft unit:=wdCharacter
    End With
        Return
      
AsciiText: A = Asc(Selection.Text): Return

End Sub

why bother with this lengthy process? - nm

Because I asked for help with one and OldHandAtThis was being helpful! sm - MTBird

please note - .

Header Macro - OldHandAtThis

I only posted this macro because I thought it would be helpful.  It was no trouble to do so whatsoever as I wrote this macro a good long time ago.  While transcribing reports, as I am mousing to this toolbar, clicking on that button, backspacing through paragraphs, etc., I find myself thinking wouldn't it be nice if . . . and if I think that thought often enough about some tedious time-consuming process, I eventually decide to take the time to write a macro to streamline the process or solve a problem.  

Oh and by the way, snarky poster, writing it was only a long-involved process for me, for anyone else it is simply a matter of cuting & pasting the code to your normal.dot or whatever template you store your macros.   And if you don't want to fool with it, so be it, it's out there for anyone that might find it use, I am certainly not going to care, I wrote it for myself because I find it quite useful. 

I decided also to wrote in a routine to take out extra spaces in the macro, and to make sure that the text starts right at the left hand margin, and that the bold and underline fonts are turned off at the end of the header, and also that the header text is always upper case, but did not use the "allcaps" font as that can sometimse make a problem in the text of the following paragraph which you then have to back and fix. 

I would suggest putting the macro on an alt or control key combination (I use Alt-H) to make it more efficient. 

I have modified this macro many times when transcribing for different clients, if you don't need all of the features of this macro, such as the bookmark, or underlining, it is a very simple matter to "comment out" those lines of code you don't need.  I would be glad to help you do this if you write me and let me know what you want. 

By the way, it was my ego that led me to respond to your question when you asked if there were any macro experts on this board -- while I don't exactly think I am an expert, I'm pretty knowledgable and I enjoy the challenge of writing a useful and easy to use macro. 

I agree with the poster who wrote that we should pass on tips, etc., that that might help us all to become more productive in this challenging competitive environment, and that was my other (more noble) reason for posting this macro, especially because I have posted questions to this board and gotten some very helpful answers.

macros, formatting, etc. - .