Table of Contents
September 29th, 2005
There are things in the life of an IT engineer that are likely to drive him insane. Not the installation of PostreSQL on OS X. Not writing multithreaded Ruby code. Not looking for performance problems in Java programs, running on Sun Solaris using vmstat, iostat and truss. Not even working with RoboHelp X5 and RoboSource Control
Table of Contents. In Word (or in OpenOffice – the two have similar approaches)
While I’m able to fathom why graphics don’t print (RoboHelp to Word to PDF conversion – a graphic that is wider than 585 pixels won’t print but just leava a big blank space on the page) I can’t produce a table of content that has a fleeting resemblance to a real one (like one you’ll find in a book). I’m able to create all kinds of abominable contortions with seemingly random numbers, tabs, indentations but nothing that conveys a sense of structure.
Applying logic doesn’t seem to help. Intuition developed during 20 years of working with computers and programs doesn’t help. Experience with PageMaker, Quark Express, Calamus and other DTP programs? Of course not!
Is it finally time for me to do Word 101?
(And sorry, but No: LaTeX or DocBook aren’t a viable alternative)
Technorati Tags: arbeitstechnik, automatisch, openoffice, word
Entry Filed under: Ramblings
6 Comments Add your own
1. Karsten W. Rohrbach | September 30th, 2005 at 04:13
One word: TeX
2. Jens-Christian Fischer | September 30th, 2005 at 08:25
re-read the last sentence ;-)
3. Nicole Simon | September 30th, 2005 at 13:55
Well, as Words enters a toc very neatly, I suspect you have not set up the elements which should be in it in the needed manor aka as headlines of the different nummers (headline 1-3).
Which can easily accomplished by going to a headline, and press accordingly alt-1 to 3, just to make sure it is really set to 1-3 (or deeper.)
Once that is done, you can then one time (or do it before starting that) change the layout rule for headings and reapply it to every heading and if you then choose “insert – reference – index and xx” (sorry, only got the german one here), you will get a toc as you desire.
The only times this did not work in all of my time helping people out with word was always that they did use their hammer as a screwdriver and complained that it did not work. AKA you may know programming, but I somehow doubt from your comment, that oyu know how to work with Word. :)
Mail me, if you need more help. ;)
4. Jens-Christian Fischer | September 30th, 2005 at 14:15
Thanks Nicole – but I “think” I have the structure set up correctly. I have the Headings (Ãœberschrift 1-3) defined in the text and they actually show up in the TOC. The problem I’m struggling with is the formatting of the TOC itself. I get numberings that are totally off:
and so on (so the second level headings are numbered through, not restarting at 1. after each heading. Also I can’t seem to get Word to display the level 2 headings as 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, 2.2 etc.
I’m totally struggling with the Numbering dialog which is (for me) totally counterintuitive.
I go to the “style formatting-dialog” for TOC1 (2, 3, whatever) and set fonts, paragraphs etc. Then there’s the formatting options for numbering which seem to work globally, not only for the currently selected style. In this dialog it seems that I can define things for all TOC styles, but they aren’t sticking.
I simply don’t understand how the TOC style definitions work. Do I have to set those definitions for all TOC styles? Do I need to set them once? Why are some changes not sticking? (There’s one where you can select the “previous level” and it offers “Ebene 1″ if I work on the TOC 2 style (or both Ebene 1 and Ebene 2 in TOC 3). But selecting “Ebene 1″ doesn’t stick. It’s not selected.
I probably need a really simple introduction into this. And yes, I know quite a bit more about programming than about Word. (But I know how to apply styles and not do any formatting by hand)
5. Karsten W. Rohrbach | October 5th, 2005 at 04:41
Pages would be a viable alternative, too… ;-)
(and, yes, I read your last sentence)
6. Jens-Christian Fischer | October 5th, 2005 at 13:32
Sorry – forgot to mention that this is but one step in converting a document written with RoboHelp XML to Word to PDF.
So we are talking Windows here.
However, thanks both to Nicole and Tanja (what would I do without women in my life) I think I understand how formatting works for TOC.
I will put my knowledge to a real life test at the end of the week and hope to create the “definitive developers guide to formatting Word TOCs” soon after.
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