Collect and move with Word's Spike
Collect and move with Word's Spike
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Tip Have you ever had to collect blocks of text and graphical images from different places in one or more Word documents, then insert them into another document? This sounds like a multistep process, but if you're working in Word 6.0 or a later version, you can simplify the job by using the Spike. The Spike, named after the old-fashioned editor's spindle, is part of Word's AutoText feature, which lets you store text for repeated use. You add text and graphics to the Spike one by one, then insert them into another document as a group. Here's how: 1. Open the document, or documents, containing the text or graphics that you want to collect. 2. Select the first item you want to send to the Spike. Keep in mind that items in the Spike are inserted in the final document in the order in which they were added. 3. Adding an item to the Spike removes it from the original document, so if you need to keep the original intact, press <Ctrl>-C to copy the item to the Windows Clipboard. 4. Press <Ctrl>-<F3> to move the first item to the Spike. 5. Press <Ctrl>-V to reinsert the item in the originating document if necessary. 6. Repeat the steps above until you've collected all the material you want to transfer.
Figure 4: Word's Spike Feature lets you gather chunks of text or graphics from several files, then move them to a new file
7. To insert all your collected material and clear the Spike's contents, position the cursor on a blank line in the document where you want the items to go, then press <Ctrl>-<Shift>-<F3>. To insert the contents of the Spike without clearing it, so that you can use the items again later, position the cursor where you want to insert the Spike material, type spike, then press <F3>. | Category: Word processing Issue: Sep 1997 Pages: 172-173 |
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