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Reformat a page while scaling all objects on the same page- Word 2003


ross549

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Sadly, this probelm is going to seriously kick my butt, and I do not want to admit defeat.

 

I have a diagram in Word (why someone used word to create a diagram in word is beyond me) that is ona page formatted as a 22x17" page. This diagram is comprised of several hundred objects all layered and positioned carefully on the page.

 

This diagram needs to be put in another document that is formatted as 11x17".

 

The objects on the source document are not grouped, nor could I ever hope to group them to be able to scale the entire document smoothly.

 

I can reformat the page to the smaller size, but then the diagram naturally falls off the page. The same thing happens when I "se;ect all" and copy the diagram the second document.

 

Is there a way to scale the page and all the objects on the page at the same time? I am googling and not turning up much of anything.

 

Thanks

 

:rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant:

 

Adam

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Yeah, I can't do that. At 11x17, a screenshot lookes like garbage. Better to not do it at all in the first place. That is the problem I am trying to correct.

 

In any case, it needs to be editable.

 

Adam

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Would I be able to edit the individual diagram objects in a PDF?

 

I know I would have to use Acrobat to do it.....

Um... yeah. A definite maybe. The way I was thinking, use the unfortunate Word document as a source/base for future edits, create a .pdf "snapshot" and see how it scales.

 

But first, check out the linky in post #7.

 

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Guest LilBambi

That could do the trick for grouping.

 

Whether that will truly fix the problem remains to be seen though.

 

This could be a really time consuming fix. You may have to group them all. Create a new document, copy and paste them all to the new document. Then you may have to resize each one or you could have jaggies everywhere...

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I could group the objects, but I dealing with at least a couple hundred objects. This is not a simple diagram. This might be the only solution, though I am not sure I will be able to group the objects, especially since some objects are hidden under others.

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This could be a really time consuming fix. You may have to group them all. Create a new document, copy and paste them all to the new document. Then you may have to resize each one or you could have jaggies everywhere...

Yeah. The smart thing to do would be going back to square one and recreate the thingy with an appropriate piece of software. Yes, I know, I know... "comprised of several hundred objects" and all that.

 

facepalmjim76437.jpg

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Guest LilBambi
I could group the objects, but I dealing with at least a couple hundred objects. This is not a simple diagram. This might be the only solution, though I am not sure I will be able to group the objects, especially since some objects are hidden under others.

Select All from the File, Edit menu?

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1) Ctrl + A for 'Select All'

2) Right click and 'Grouping' > Group

3) Right click again, but this time make sure you right click on one of the handling points, choose 'Properties'

4) Click on 'Size' tab.

5) Check the box for 'Lock aspect ratio'

6) Under the scaling options, choose the height & width desired.

Edited by Tushman
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Send an email to Teacher/Julia.

She's worked pretty extensively with various versions of Office and she might have a few ideas.

 

I emailed her when I had a problem and our Office Bible didn't mention anything about what we needed to do.

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OK, I think we might actually have a workable idea!

 

LilBambi, the selection when doing Ctrl-A seemed different, like I would not be able to group objects. It looked more like selecting the text on the page. I am not sure if that explains it properly. Once I did Ctrl-A and grouped everything, I was able to scale at will! However, the text is not scaling with the objects, so I will have to manually adjust the font size.

 

I thought I was going to have to Ctrl-click every object on the page. Assuming that I did not inadvertantly click something incorrectly, I was betting it would take me an hour to click everything with the Ctrl key pressed. Further complicating this is the fact that if you click a text box in the wrong spot (even with Ctrl pressed), it will de-select everything else. Oy!

 

I've dealt with this before, though on a much smaller scale. In the end, it took me two weeks to get the final product to the point that would work for our usage scenario.

 

Adam

 

PS- thanks also for the tip, Tushman. Does the scale option in that dialog also scale the text, or is it just scaling the size of the text box?

 

;)

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OK, I think we might actually have a workable idea!

 

LilBambi, the selection when doing Ctrl-A seemed different, like I would not be able to group objects. It looked more like selecting the text on the page. I am not sure if that explains it properly. Once I did Ctrl-A and grouped everything, I was able to scale at will! However, the text is not scaling with the objects, so I will have to manually adjust the font size.

 

I thought I was going to have to Ctrl-click every object on the page. Assuming that I did not inadvertantly click something incorrectly, I was betting it would take me an hour to click everything with the Ctrl key pressed. Further complicating this is the fact that if you click a text box in the wrong spot (even with Ctrl pressed), it will de-select everything else. Oy!

 

I've dealt with this before, though on a much smaller scale. In the end, it took me two weeks to get the final product to the point that would work for our usage scenario.

 

Adam

 

PS- thanks also for the tip, Tushman. Does the scal option in that dialog also scale the text, or is it just scaling the size of the text box?

 

;)

 

 

The scaling option that I mentioned works for any object ** that you select. It does not apply to font sizes however. So if you have some text within a text box, or text within the document body, it will remain the same. As you have found out, you will need to adjust the font size yourself accordingly. And speaking of fitting the text within your shapes, you can play around with the internal margins to make your text fit. However, depending on the type of font and shapes you're dealing with, shrinking the internal margins (you may find) is not always insufficient.

 

** including text boxes/drawing ojects/pictures/Word Art/clipart. Basically anything that is not pure text.

 

In these types of situations, I personally like to lay a clear text box on top of the original shape and type (or just copy & paste) the text inside the clear text box. You may find it a little bit easier to work with if you start out by inserting a clear text box on a blank document (Ctrl + N) first. This will eliminate the hassle of trying to manipulate two overlapping objects as the handling points may for the two objects get in the way of each other. Once you have your text fully typed (or copy/paste), you can copy & paste the entire text box into your original document and position it as necessary.

Edited by Tushman
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1) Ctrl + A for 'Select All'

2) Right click and 'Grouping' > Group

3) Right click again, but this time make sure you right click on one of the handling points, choose 'Properties'

4) Click on 'Size' tab.

5) Check the box for 'Lock aspect ratio'

6) Under the scaling options, choose the height & width desired.

 

This used to work for me in the past (Office 2003/2002/2000). I've subsequently found out that the method for selecting all objects in Word 2007 is not the same as for previous versions. I will have to do a little research to see how the same can be achieved in Word 2007 & update my post. Right now I have to run out for a quick errand.

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Update to my previous post. If you're using Word 2007/2010, the following steps will work.

 

With your document open, click on the Home tab. On the far right, you'll the Editing group.

 

word2007selecto.png

 

This will activate the 'select' mode within Word. The ojective here is to "grab" as many of those objects as you can. So starting at the very top left corner (preferably somewhere within your margin area) or a blank area within your document, left click and drag your mouse cursor diagonally to the bottom corner opposite end. See screenshot as an example.

 

word2007outline.png

 

When you let go of the mouse click, all the objects within that dotted rectangle area should be selected. See the result here:

 

word2007allobjects.png

 

From here you can group them all, and resize as needed.

Edited by Tushman
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The scaling option that I mentioned works for any object ** that you select. It does not apply to font sizes however. So if you have some text within a text box, or text within the document body, it will remain the same. As you have found out, you will need to adjust the font size yourself accordingly. And speaking of fitting the text within your shapes, you can play around with the internal margins to make your text fit. However, depending on the type of font and shapes you're dealing with, shrinking the internal margins (you may find) is not always insufficient.

 

** including text boxes/drawing ojects/pictures/Word Art/clipart. Basically anything that is not pure text.

 

In these types of situations, I personally like to lay a clear text box on top of the original shape and type (or just copy & paste) the text inside the clear text box. You may find it a little bit easier to work with if you start out by inserting a clear text box on a blank document (Ctrl + N) first. This will eliminate the hassle of trying to manipulate two overlapping objects as the handling points may for the two objects get in the way of each other. Once you have your text fully typed (or copy/paste), you can copy & paste the entire text box into your original document and position it as necessary.

 

Yeah, there's a LOT of text boxes being used as labels. Some are normal left to right, others are tilted. Your idea in this case would not work.

 

I will look at the other options you posted. I don't want to be caught by Word again.

 

Adam

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Yeah, there's a LOT of text boxes being used as labels. Some are normal left to right, others are tilted. Your idea in this case would not work.

 

I will look at the other options you posted. I don't want to be caught by Word again.

 

Adam

 

You can change the font size globally throughout the document. While you have all your objects selected, click on the home tab and type in the font size desired in the font group menu.

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Oh, I know about visio!

 

We just don't have access to it at work. The US Navy provides us will all the software we need. Ha!

 

:D

 

Adam

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Getting my hands on a copy is not the problem. Getting it installed onto our network is the problem. We'd also have to make sure the person in charge of this data could maintain it after I transfer, and he is in California.

 

In short, Visio is not authorized on our network, so I could not put it onto a computer.

 

I wish it was possible.

 

Adam

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I played around with it today. I was able to group the whole mess and scale it.

 

I started going to the billion or so text blocks that i have to change font size in. I think I got maybe 1/20 the way through before stopping. I think I spent almost two hours on it today.

 

Adam

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I started going to the billion or so text blocks that i have to change font size in. I think I got maybe 1/20 the way through before stopping. I think I spent almost two hours on it today.

 

Adam

 

 

Why didn't you tell me you have such a large number of text boxes? Reducing the font (en masse) for all those text boxes can be achieved easily with VBA. The issue is how tiny the fonts needs to be shrunk. The VBA macro cannot make some some text boxes 1 size and another group of boxes another unless there is some distinguishing feature/aspect. However writing up a VBA to make ALL of them a specific size is easy enough to do. Post back if you need such help. I can have something ready for you by the end of Friday or Saturday.

 

I would need the following:

1. version of word you're using

2. font name used in those text boxes.

3. the size you need them changed to.

Edited by Tushman
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Yep. It sure is awful. This should have never been made in MS Word. It is making my life (at least the time I work on it) painful.

 

Tushman, thanks for the offer to help with the script. I wish I could take you up on your offer, but the job simply has too many variables. ;)

 

Adam

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