One problem I have with Microsoft Word is that, when I define a block that is more than one page long, it scrolls so fast that it is almost impossible to control. This worked fine with slower computers, but has not been adjusted for faster ones. We need some kind of speed control.
What are your problems and suggested innovations for Microsoft Word???
I would like to see them fix the problems with bullets and numbering. I want ME to control where I put bullets and numbering, not have the computer stick them in autmatically way too often, and then I have a bitch of a time getting them out again. Also, when it automatically bullets things, I want to be able to put my cursor at the start of the bullet, not just after them.
Page numbering. It’s so simple in Word Perfect. Why can’t the MS people figure out that their system for this function sucks?
I’m with you, Creaky. I’ve had to spend a ridiculous amount of time trying to get the page numbering just so on some manuscripts that have to be formatted in the proper format for submission. That means starting the page numbering on the second page. Has anybody tried starting the page numbering on the second page and have it blanked out on the first, while having it within the header? MS Word has a silly set-up for this. WordPerfect was simplicity itself.
I want a feature that will telepathically interact with one of my co-workers so that no matter what silly method she uses to achieve some goal, Word will understand and do what she means, not what she says.
This would be useful to me as she would stop coming to me for help, and I wouldn’t have to embarrass her by performing her “apparently impossible” task in 0.76 seconds.
Good suggestions so far. I especially like featherlou’s, because I find that the numbering function especially needs work. Well, the page numbering is also a particular problem, Creaky.
But if I had to cite one thing, it would be to leave the user with a “bare bones” version after installation that lets the user make it as complicated as necessary, rather than beginning with a complicated version after installation and forcing the user to make it simpler from there.
Some examples? Well, I don’t need or want to be able to choose from a number of bullets in different shapes and sizes. I don’t want to spend a lot of time and effort redefining styles (especially trying to convince MSWord that its default style is not the one I want to use). I don’t want to have my spelling automatically corrected (I’m in Canada so my clients are as likely to want US spellings as they are UK spellings), and I don’t want to have to burrow through a series of tabbed dialogs to figure out where to disable that function. I also don’t want MSWord to replace what I type–as when it automatically capitalizes words that I must have rendered in lower case.
Such a version would also keep people who really shouldn’t be using anything other than Notepad from sending me documents that use six different fonts in four different sizes, all indiscriminately bolded and italicized, on the same page. They have far too much to choose from and they are determined to use it all.
And don’t even get me started on that blasted paper clip (which I did manage to disable). Somebody once said that the paper clip is the result of the marketing department getting their hands on the original specifications document. I have to agree.
Amen to the above suggestions, especially the bulleting/numbering thing. As an attorney, I’ve come very, very close to heaving my computer out the window when I try to do a motion and have to spend all this time getting the formatting correct for numbered paragraphs.
And don’t get me started on page numbering…
What I want most of all is an application tailored to my particular usage- I don’t need all the bells and whistles concerning business applications. I’d love to see them sell a stripped down version of Word, with almost notepad-like features, and then have the ability to purchase particular application add-ons, like a legal package, or a medical package…
Actually, what I really want is for WP 5.1 to still work on my computer…
One word:
Headers.
This would include the page numbering disaster in all forms. I’d also like to get into the codes. In Word Perfect, if you don’t know what’s going on, you just hit Alt-F3, and there is everything. Word tries to be real user friendly and assume what you’re doing, and in effect making itself look like an annoying older brother asserting his idea of what a properly formatted document looks like.
God I hate Word!
Today I was struggling with the autoindent.
I indented one paragraph and couldn’t figur out any way to get back to the left margin. I just refused to let me. I ended up starting over and using tabs instead of indent.
What you would have had to do is to click your mouse on some spot in the paragraph, go up to FORMAT, then Paragraph,
and then make sure you have no left margin or “hanging” first line, then type OK.
That should have done it.
It might just be me, but footnotes at the bottom of the page like to jump onto the next page instead of remaining put at the bottom of the current page.
Back to what Ma Parrot and berdollos were discussing: This is part of the bullets/numbering pain in the ass for me. Once Word starts deciding where your margins are, it seems like the only way to get rid of it is with a very large sledgehammer. I like the idea of a stripped down version of Word that has a exhaustive list of options that I can enable for myself. (And that %##*&% paper clip? There’s a special pool of bubbling lava reserved in hell for the creator of that little gem.)
I just installed Office 2000 the other day. You can set up exactly what you want installed. You can give yourself barebones if you want. It’s not just like one or two tabs though, you actually get pretty good control over what you want installed. You can also set it up so you can install some of those features later if you find that you need them. Or, you can set it up so that Office will never look for those features. Or, you can run them from the disc.
i havent figured out how to draw a straightline across the page.
Berdellos, you can use the drawing tools (hold Shift to get the line to be perfectly horizontal). Or you can format a paragraph to have a border - highlight a paragraph mark and go to Borders&Shading, then apply a top or bottom border.
It’s kinda kludgy and not the web integration that was promised for Word 2000 (which as a web designer, I’m not sure was a great idea anyway) - in HTML, and in Microsoft Front Page, you can simply insert a horizontal rule. Word makes you work a bit harder.
Which seems to be the theme of Word. I spend more time undoing its incorrect automatic formatting than I would have spent formatting manually myself. It’s all about more work. More charitably: Word’s creators have made the program far too smart for its own britches, which is a nightmare for those of us who were once proficient word processors ourselves.
My worst example of this is outlines with multiple levels of indents. At some point, Word decides that when I hit Tab, I mean to increase the paragraph indent. I usually have to go copy an actual Tab character from elsewhere in the document, in order to paste a real Tab into an indented section.
As I said in an earlier Word thread, I just need to get a job where I don’t have to use Word anymore.
Good luck. When you find it, forward their HR address to me. Even the legal industry (which was a heavy user of WP) is switching over to Word. However, there has been rumors that Word will be implementing (or at least SOMEONE is implementing) a java-like window that will function like WP that will cover the Word screen. I dunno, seems pretty half-assed to me.
The damn AutoFormat!
Trying to format a paper and it automatically decides that it is going take over and do it for me.
“Listen. I appreciate you trying to help me out here, but I would rather do it myself and have more control than saving 2-3 keystrokes. When you know what I am doing it works fine, but when you are wrong you really ruin my day.”