Knowledge Base

WD98: Style Doesn't Change with Automatically Update Setting On

Article ID: 177723

Article Last Modified on 10/31/2006

Microsoft Word 98 for Macintosh

This article was previously published under Q177723

SYMPTOMS

When you have the Automatically Update setting turned on for a particular style, changes are not always reflected in the definition for the style or in the Style dialog box.

CAUSE

This problem occurs if you have selected more than one paragraph and you make manual changes to update the style.

WORKAROUND

Select only one paragraph when you make manual changes to the style. With only one paragraph selected, the changes will be automatically applied to any other text formatted with that style in the document, and the changes will be displayed in the Style dialog box and in the definition of the style found by clicking Style on the Format menu.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

When the Automatically Update setting is turned on for a style, the style is automatically updated when you apply manual formatting to text that is formatted with that style (this rule applies to all styles except for the Normal style). That is, when you manually format text in an area of your document that has a specific style applied to it, the other text in the document that is formatted with that same style is updated to include whatever manual formatting changes you make.

The setting to automatically update a style can be turned on or off for each individual style. To do this, follow these steps:

On the Format menu, click Style.
Under Styles, click the name of the Style that you want to modify.
Click Modify and then under Description, click to select the Automatically Update check box.
Click OK and then click Close.

For additional information the automatic features of Word, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

159941 WD97: General Information about "Auto" Features in Word 97

170351 WD97: Style Drop-down Shows Styles Out of Order

Additional query words: word8 word97

Keywords: kbbug KB177723