Creating Custom AutoText Categories

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 6, 2023)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

When you choose AutoText from the Insert menu, you may have noticed that Word divides the various available AutoText entries into submenus. If you understand what these submenus represent, you can understand how to create your own submenus.

When you create an AutoText entry in Word, it examines the paragraph style used by the text in the AutoText Selection. If it is a paragraph style that matches the name of one of the submenu items in the AutoText menu, then Word files the entry in that submenu. If it is not, then Word starts a new submenu item with that same name as the paragraph style and then files the new AutoText entry under that submenu. In other words, the submenu names are the same as the styles used in the various AutoText entries.

For example, let's say you are going to create new AutoText entries, and you will name them "dog," "cat," and "bird." Further, let's assume you have a style named "Pet." When the three AutoText entries are created, if each of them is formatted with the Pet style, then they will appear in an AuotText submenu called Pet.

For more information on AutoText categories, you may find this article at the Word MVP site helpful:

http://wordmvp.com/FAQs/TblsFldsFms/AutoTextList.htm

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1625) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

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