Formatting in Word Output

[jhamrick]

Producing Word output works really well except for headings. These are autonumbered (1.0, 1.1 etc.) and the number is supposed to hang into the left margin while the text of the heading aligns with the body text. In the Word output, the number aligns with the margin. Does anyone know how to get the output to honor the hanging autonumber from the Flare output.

(In case you are wondering, the primary print output is PDF and the autonumber works well there. I generate Word output so that reviewers can easily make edits.)

[lacastle]

How are you making the heading hang over into the margin? Are you using a negative number?

This may just be a feature that doesn't translate easily Word, even though the option is available in Word do to negative indents.

[jhamrick]

I'm using the mc-auto-number-offset with the mc-auto-number-position: outside-head.

You're probably right that Word isn't recognizing this. Does anyone know of another way of getting this type of formatting that Word could use?

[LTinker68]

Try doing what Laura suggested. Set the auto-number position to its default value, but set a negative left margin on the heading style and see if that flows to Word. If not, and you really want that effect, the alternative is to set the heading style to a left margin of 0 and set a left margin of .25 inches or whatever on all other tags that you might use (e.g., p, table, ol/ul, div, etc.). You'd probably want to decrease your body tag's left margin, too.

[jhamrick]

Using the negative margin appears to go into Word okay, but the alignment for the heading varies based on the length of the autonumber (not the case when using the mc-auto-number-offset). Also, if the heading wraps, the text goes under the number rather than under the text on the first line. And this happens in the PDF, which is my primary target, so I think my best solution is to return to my original configuration and just manually alter the headings in the Word document each time I generate the file. Thank you for your help.

[ChoccieMuffin]

In Word, after you've imported, how do your chapter numbers appear?

If they're just the straight text, e.g. "1.[space]Chapter title" then you could do a search and replace, changing "<number> full stop space" (sorry, forgotten the exact thing you have to put into Word's search and replace box for a number - it's 9.45pm on a Friday and there's only half a bottle of wine left!) with "<find what text> tab" (and a tab is "^t", I remembered that bit! ) and then format Heading 1 to have a tab stop at a sensible place that will cope with the widest chapter number, and the lovely hanging indent that Flare doesn't recognise, so your number's on its own.

Would that work for you?

[wclass]

Here's something that has worked for me:

Set your heading style (I set this only in my "msword" medium) to:

• have a number followed by a space,
• set "mc-auto-number-offset" to a positive number (this becomes the hanging indent amount), and
• "mc-auto-number-position" to inside-head.

In Word, the output is generated with the number followed by the space then the heading text, and it should be pushed in the left margin by the offset (appears negative but you don't need to enter a negative number). If you want the heading text to align with the body you will have to change that space to a tab - try this:

• Select Find/Replace (^H)
• Put the cursor in the "Find What box
• Enter [0-9]* (that has a space at the end - says find numbers followed by a space. If you have a full stop or colon on your number you'll have to add that as part of the find).
• From the Format selection box down the bottom, choose Style and pick H1 - your replace applies only to H1 paragraphs.
• In the Replace box, enter ^&^t (says replace what I found followed by a tab)
• And check the Use Wildcards options

You might have to repeat for H2 if they are offset as well.

This is fine for sending work to reviewers. However, setting numbers in Flare means they are hard-coded in the Word document. I don't do this any more - I don't number headings, I just apply my own template once the doc has been generated, and it applies Word heading styles.