MS Word Style List tool?

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Does anyone know of a tool for listing out the characteristics of the styles in a document/template? I have written macros that use the Style.Description information, but that’s inadequate: It skips information, doesn’t always include numbering, and is generally hard to read.

Something that produced a spreadsheet would be ideal.
Something that could also take such a spreadsheet, and rebuild all the styles (including the dreaded list templates) would be even better.

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Does anyone know of a tool for listing out the characteristics of the styles in a document/template? I have written macros that use the Style.Description information, but that’s inadequate: It skips information, doesn’t always include numbering, and is generally hard to read.

Something that produced a spreadsheet would be ideal.
Something that could also take such a spreadsheet, and rebuild all the styles (including the dreaded list templates) would be even better.

Until W2010, we could get style information from system Information when it is invoked from within a Word document. In W2003 it’s Help > About > System Info > Office application > MS Word. In W2007, its Office button >options > resources > about > System Info… > and so forth. Neither the beta nor the trial shows information for Office 2010.

Below is a sample. Is this close to what you are looking for?

Name: Heading 1 Description: Font: (Default) Arial, 12 pt, Bold, Font color: Custom Color(RGB(76,114,29)), Shadow, Small caps, Do not check spelling or grammar, Indent: Left: 0″ Hanging: 0.3″, Left Line spacing: single, Space After: 6 pt, Keep with next, Level 1, Outline numbered + Level: 1 + Numbering Style: 1, 2, 3, … + Start at: 1 + Alignment: Left + Aligned at: 0″ + Indent at: 0.3″, Style: Linked, Quick Style Following style: Normal
Base style: Next style: Normal
Built-in: True No proofing: True
Automatically update: False

Name: Heading 2 Description: Font: Times New Roman, Bold, Shadow, Indent: Left: 0″ Hanging: 0.4″, Space Before: 12 pt After: 3 pt, No widow/orphan control, Keep with next, Level 2 Tab stops: 0.31″, Left, Outline numbered + Level: 2 + Numbering Style: 1, 2, 3, … + Start at: 1 + Alignment: Left + Aligned at: 0″ + Indent at: 0.4″, Style: Linked, Quick Style Based on: Normal Following style: Normal
Base style: Normal Next style: Normal
Built-in: True No proofing: False
Automatically update: False

Name: Heading 3 Description: Font: Times New Roman, Bold, Shadow, Indent: Left: 0″ Hanging: 0.5″, Space Before: 6 pt After: 2 pt, No widow/orphan control, Keep with next, Level 3 Tab stops: 0.44″, Left, Outline numbered + Level: 3 + Numbering Style: 1, 2, 3, … + Start at: 1 + Alignment: Left + Aligned at: 0.31″ + Indent at: 0.81″, Style: Linked, Quick Style Based on: Normal Following style: Normal
Base style: Normal Next style: Normal
Built-in: True No proofing: False
Automatically update: False

Pam

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Pam,
All these years I’ve been working with Word, and I’ve never stumbled on the output from System Info.
It’s OK, but it’s still just the description.(plus some other stuff like the base style, following style).

What I’d really like is more of a structured table: Font (tab) Font Size (tab) Italic (tab) Bold (tab)…….
Straight CSVs, XML, whatever, anything better than the flat text the .Description property creates, so long as every row had the same number of columns in the same places every time.

Joel

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Does not File, Print and then select Styles from the Print All Pages drop down provide sufficient detail? (W2007/W2010)?

In previous versions, it is File, Print, and select Styles from the Print What box.

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Actually, the first reply was better — it could be exported to a text file.

This is still just the style description.
But it’s still not tabular, and in my experience, Word chooses to drop things it thinks aren’t important, like numbering info, the font size if it’s common to lots of styles, etc.

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Actually, the first reply was better — it could be exported to a text file.

This is still just the style description.
But it’s still not tabular, and in my experience, Word chooses to drop things it thinks aren’t important, like numbering info, the font size if it’s common to lots of styles, etc.

I think you’re right. What it doesn’t show are the settings for a style that do not differ from the defaults or from the style it is based on. I do understand what you mean about wanting it in a table. I tried, when I first found system info, to get the style settings into a tabular format quickly, preferably automatically. But, in large part because of the wacky way they’ve formatted it, not to mention my lack of VBA skills, I had no luck. Still, since you can save it as a file, it can be handy. I have reconstructed a deleted style from the info and have searched for styles that have a paticular attribute. Even though I use it to get Word document information only few a year, I will miss it when I switch to W2010.

Pam

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Joel

I haven’t learnt all the components of a standard docx zip file but there may be a single subdocument contained in that file format that only contains the style definitions. If you rename a word docx file as .zip and look at the word/styles.xml file in there then you should be able to just harvest/replace that component.

Another alternative is – Have you investigated the document in a text editor after saving as XML? This must contain all the style definitions and already be in a very structured format.

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Thanks folks. My VBA skillz are pretty mad, but I’m lazy. If somebody else had done it before me, I’d pick it up. Googling on “Microsoft Word Style Report” was extremely unsuccessful due to how common those words are, so I tried here.

Looks like I’ll have to build it myself.

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