RE: Standard Word doc to Book format

Hi Tom,
Thanks for the detailed response.

My proposal document is simply a continuation of the cover letter - but the
signature page is on page 2 or 3 depending on how wordy I get in my writing.

So, the content of the proposal consists of:
1) Headers and footers
2) Several Sections
3) Excel cells copied/pasted into the document
4) Some standard generic text.

I don't have graphics or imbedded hyperlinks. Although I once did have the
Excel linkage it was too much of an pain for me to work with copies since the
Excel document changes quite often, typically each quote/proposal as I refine
things for the specific prospect.

So, I'm just needing to do the "Book-thing" (or whatever) based upon the
above.

What would you suggest that I do for the future from here? Start over
convert gradually/whole hog to another format or what? Word 2007 is in my
future in about 90-180+ days, I'd say, but no rush.
TIA,

"Tom Conrad" wrote:

Sorry for the double post, I had a glitch and my initial response was lost.

My initial question to you, is what do you mean by book format?
Do you mean,
- Cover letter,
- TOC listing chapters/sections
- list of figures
- list of tables
- list of acronyms/terms
- glossary (definitions)
- list of effective pages (sometimes used when a document under goes
periodic revision.
- list of citations, references and footnotes (if applicable)
- Chapters
- Appendices (lists of acronyms, glossary, etc.

If this is what you mean by book format, then a Quick and easy conversion
wholly depends upon the structure of the current document.

- Is the document based upon a user defined template file?
- Does the document have an identifiable outline structure?
(Chapters or major sections with sub sections)
- Did you use styles (heading 1, heading 2, etc.)
- Did you create the styles yourself, or allow word to create them for you?
- Does the document have a lot of direct formatting vice styled formatting?
- Did you use tabs and indents vice the space bar to align paragraphs?
- Did you use field codes?
- Did you use headers and footers, and did you select to use different
headers/footers for the initial page, and for odd/even pages?
- Did you create/use a custom dictionary for the project?
- Does document contain embedded or hyperlinked tables, graphics?
- Are the margins consistent throughout the document?
- Does the document use section breaks?

All of these questions can affect whether the conversion is quick and easy.
Ideally, the final format for a document is determined before the document is
created.
To find out if your document can be converted with out too much effort, you
will need to work on a copy of the document.

At a minimum, to convert the document you will need to use outlining and/or
styles, and/or field codes to:
- mark the major and minor sections of the document.
- mark the titles for the figures, graphics and tables that you want to
list within the TOC.
- mark the words, phrases, concepts that you want to index.
- mark, identify or create a list of the acronyms used within the document.
- create a glossary if applicable.
- mark the titles, captions of figures and tables

===
- Creating a Table of contents
(Word 2003: insert menu, reference, index and tables, Table of contents tab)

You will find numerous help pages on the MVP sites, and several entries
within this and other user groups on how to create a TOC. It is pretty easy.
Word is really good at creating TOCs for documents that use outlining, or
that use heading styles to identify the documents structure.

The TOC function defaults to look for either or both heading styles or
outline levels (up to 9 levels). The user can set how many levels are listed
in the final TOC by changing the settings found under the options button on
the TOC tab.

Generally, Word can also create a usable TOC for documents that do not have
defined outline levels and styles, provided that the user has used some form
of formatting. For example, if a single line sentence fragment precedes a
full paragraph, then the TOC function may identify that the fragment is a
header.

== Creating an INDEX
(Word 2003: insert menu, reference, index and tables, Index tab)

To create an index, the document must contain markings to identify which
words will be included in the index. (The index function works with the
search function to mark the desired words. So it is not necessary to go
through the document line by line, word by word and manually mark all
occurrences of indexed words.

The bottom line,
So... if you have a structured document, then it may be possible to easily
create a TOC. If you already know the words that you want to index, and if
the list is relatively short, then it is also fairly easy to create your
index.

Tom C

===
"Tom" wrote:

Word 2003 SP2 all updates
Windows XP Pro SP2 all updates

I have a proposal that I'm working on and the content of the proposal is
getting pretty large. What I'd like to do is to have a 1-2 page cover letter
and then have the proposal be in a 'book format'. That is, since the
proposal is about 30+ pages long, I'd like to have a Table of Contents, Index
etc.

Is there a quick and easy way to convert a standard Word *.doc document to a
'book format'? What options do I have to do this and can I 'go back' if I
don't like the result(s)?

I'm open to separating the Cover Letter of 2-3 pages from the Proposal
Document ('book').

TIA,
.

Loading