Word 2007: Outline numbering

Another thing Word 2007 has hidden very well from power users is outline numbering. You used to access it from the Styles and Formatting task pane, but don’t try that in Word 2007 otherwise none of your numbered headings will connect to each other! And there’s no easy way to see what to do to get it working.

However, help is at hand in these Microsoft forum posts and replies by some Microsoft Word MVPs (I’ve used TinyURL to shorten these horrendously long URLs):

• http://tinyurl.com/5prd8g (“Word 2007 Outline-Numbered Heading Styles” in the Word General Questions forum)
• http://tinyurl.com/5lcjpc (search results for “Word 2007 create outline numbered styles” in the Word New Users forum)
• http://tinyurl.com/559udx (search results for “Outline Numbering” in the Word Numbering forum; not just for Word 2007)

BTW, Microsoft MVPs are unsung heroes in my book. They are not employees, they don’t get many benefits, and they volunteer their time freely. All the ones I know, or whose names I regularly see in forums, contribute an enormous amount of time and effort for little or no benefit to them. They’ll test things and report their findings, and they do it all for free. Congratulations guys—Microsoft should reward you handsomely for eliminating many of their support calls!

See also:

• Christine Kent’s blog post on Word Numbering and Multi-Level Lists
• Numbering Headings in Word 2007 Multilevel lists (from Dummies.com) (thanks for this link, Jean P)

[Links last checked June 2009]