Please Note: This article is written for users of the following Microsoft Word versions: 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. If you are using a later version (Word 2007 or later), this tip may not work for you. For a version of this tip written specifically for later versions of Word, click here: Adding Tags to Text.

Adding Tags to Text

by Allen Wyatt
(last updated October 12, 2013)

4

If you love working in HTML, you know that it is created by simply adding tags to regular text. Tags do nothing more than describe how a browser should display the text. HTML can be created by hand or automatically, by program. You can even use Word to create your HTML for you. What if you don't want Word to do the HTML automatically, but you want to use Word's tools to help you in your HTML creation? For instance, you might want to search for italicized text within a document and then surround it with the HTML tags that signify the text should be displayed in italics. You can do this by following these steps:
  1. Press Ctrl+H. Word displays the Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.
  2. Click on the More button, if it is available. (See Figure 1.)

    3. Figure 1. The Replace tab of the Find and Replace dialog box.

  3. With the insertion point in the Find What box, click the Format button and choose Font. Word displays the Find Font dialog box. (See Figure 2.)

    4. Figure 2. The Find Font dialog box.

  4. In the Font Style list, choose Italic.
  5. Click on OK to dismiss the Find Font dialog box.
  6. In the Replace With box, enter "<i>^&</i>" (without the quote marks). Both <i> and </i> are HTML tags for italics, and ^& is the special code for the Find What text. In other words, you want to replace what you find with what you found, but make sure it is surrounded by the HTML tags for italics.
  7. With the insertion point still in the Replace With box, click the Format button and choose Font to again display the Find Font dialog box.
  8. Scroll down in the Font Style list and choose Not Italic. You want to do this so that when the find and replace operation is done, not only have you added the proper HTML tags, but you are turning off the italics attribute of the found text. This is important so that if you later run the same macro on the same document, you don't get large numbers of nested HTML tags.
  9. Click on OK to dismiss the Find Font dialog box.
  10. Click on Replace All to process the entire document, or use the other buttons in the Find and Replace dialog box to step through the occurrences of italic text one at a time.
The same find and replace technique can be used to add other HTML tags, as desired. For instance, you could add the tags for bold text, <b> and </b> by searching for Bold in step 4, using the proper tags in step 6, and replacing with Not Bold in step 8.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (1904) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003. You can find a version of this tip for the ribbon interface of Word (Word 2007 and later) here: Adding Tags to Text.

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. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Centering a Custom Paper Size on a Piece of Letter-Sized Paper

Sometimes getting your printed output to match your expectations can be a challenge. Such is the case when you want to ...

Discover More

Understanding How Word Stores Paragraph Formatting

Believe it or not, if you know how Word stores paragraph formatting, it can help you in your editing.

Discover More

Make AutoCorrect Pay Attention to Character Case

If you rely on AutoText (as most Word users do), you may have noticed that it doesn't always give the desired results ...

Discover More

Do More in Less Time! Are you ready to harness the full power of Word 2013 to create professional documents? In this comprehensive guide you'll learn the skills and techniques for efficiently building the documents you need for your professional and your personal life. Check out Word 2013 In Depth today!

More WordTips (menu)

Searching for Text With a Certain Format

The Find and Replace tool in Word is very powerful. You can use it to search not only for text but for the formatting ...

Discover More

Searching for Text Not Using a Certain Style

Word is very flexible in what it allows you to search for. One thing it can't do, however, is allow you to search for ...

Discover More

Searching for Formatting

When searching for text, Word can pay attention to more than just the characters in the text. It can also pay attention ...

Discover More
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is seven more than 6?

2016-05-13 06:42:57

Rafal

I noticed now that this method don't work propierty for text in table cell.

For example. If below only "bold" word is bolded:

This is bold text

then in results I have:

This is bold<b></b> text

2016-01-21 05:52:38

Sanjay Kumar

How will convert XML tag to MS word style using the macro in MS 2003 eg. XML TAg is <abc> and style in ms word should be same e.g "abc".

2015-08-08 04:55:16

DD

I've got word 97 and am trying to create paragraph tags. Have tried to follow your advice but got stuck. Should I be doing something different.

2013-10-24 12:56:40

Ivan

Thank you! It is exactly what I was looking for. ++++

This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the menu interface (Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, or Word 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.

Newest Tips
Subscribe

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

(Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone, ever.)

View the most recent newsletter.

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR AUTHORS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2018 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.