Using the Organizer to Manage Styles

Styles allow you to provide patterns for how text should appear within your document. Styles can be defined for particular documents, or they can be collected together and stored in templates (which can, in turn, be associated with a document).

As you work with a document or a template, the number of styles you use can grow rapidly. At some time you may want to delete styles, rename them, or copy them from a one template or document to another. The easiest way to perform these tasks is by using the Organizer.

To use the Organizer to manage your styles, follow these general steps:

1. Start the Organizer.
2. Make sure the Styles tab is selected. (See Figure 1.)



Figure 1. The Styles tab of the Organizer.

3. Examine the left and right side of the Organizer. Each side can display the styles in either a document or a template.
4. Use the pull-down lists on either the left or right to indicate the template or document whose styles you want to manage.
5. If you cannot locate the desired template or document using the pull-down lists, click on the Close button on one side to "free up" an area. Then click on the Open button to locate and open the desired template or document.
6. Select the style you want to copy, rename, or delete.
7. Click on the Copy button to copy the style to the other document or template. If the target file already has a style with the name of the style being copied, you are asked if you want to replace it.
8. Click on the Rename button to change the name of the selected style. The Organizer prompts you for a new name.
9. Click on the Remove button to delete the selected style. The Organizer asks you to confirm your action.
10. Repeat steps 6 through 9 for each style you want to affect.
11. Click on Close when done.

A couple of caveats should be mentioned. The style lists for a particular document or template represent the styles in use in that file. This could, of course, include any of Word's predefined styles. (Such as Heading 1 through Heading 9.) You can select these styles and easily copy, delete, or rename them. If you rename them, your new name is simply appended to the end of the built-in style name. If you delete them, it appears that they disappear, but the next time you open the template or document, the style will reappear. In other words—you cannot use the Organizer to delete Word's predefined styles.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1351) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.