Establishing desired formatting from client document based on a master document formats

Topic

New Reply

I have a client that sends a Word doc to his clients. His clients fill in blanks (simply by typing) and add and delete sentences, phrases, etc.
They then send the Word doc back to him. He copies the Word doc and pastes the copy into a Master which has various formatting styles used (like font, font size, numbering, bullets, etc.). The copy/paste naturally employes the formats from the client document, but he wants to format the incoming document to meet his criteria in the Master.

To make the modifications throughout (generally 10 pages, give or take), is a labor-intensive task. I’m thinking that various STYLES should be established in the Master that can then be used after selecting pages, outline lists, etc. and the result should be what he wants in the Master.

So, I’m looking for a “yes/no” on this approach or any suggestions that there is or might be a better approach to solving this.

Thanks in advance.

Reply | Quote

Replies

Yes

Styles are always the answer.

There is undoubtedly ways to streamline the process but without seeing the scope of the input and Master documents I can’t really suggest any wonder solutions. A really slick way would be to use linked content controls to provide a way of transferring the customer edits across to a master document (via an xml file) so no further editing is required at all but the development is likely to be tricky.

Reply | Quote

Hi kweaver,
I’m not sure if the following will meet your client’s need, but I’ve sometimes copied from the Word source document and pasted into a text editor that does not recognize or preserve formatting (e.g., Notepad), copied from that text editor and pasted into a master Word document, and then applied Word macros to format that pasted matter to my taste.

Dave

Reply | Quote

Two good thoughts which were what I initially thought were the only/best ways. Andrew’s other idea is worth my considering, but not sure it that’s worth the tricky effort involved. Will see. Thanks to both of you.

Reply | Quote