A very comprehensive website (http://www.mvps.org/word) is run by the people who lead the excellent newsgroup mentioned in the next paragraph. Among other things, it contains answers (at http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs) to many frequently asked questions posed in this and other newsgroups for Word on the Mac and Windows platforms. In particular, if you need comprehensive information on a problem, chances are that other people have had it before and a thorough explanation is at this website.
The newsgroup at: microsoft.public.mac.office.word
is well worth visiting for on-going discussion of all versions of Word on the Mac and their "charming foibles", as one participant puts it. Searching by topic over the previous few months when you first visit it is a rewarding strategy. The feature that made this newsgroup stand out during the time I prepared these notes was the comprehensive, painstaking, expert advice by volunteers whom Microsoft have dubbed "MVPs", standing for "Most Valuable Professionals". Their high level of expertise and willingness to give thorough, clear replies is unusual, since comment in most newsgroups is casual, cryptic and ambiguous.
I refer to this as "the Word newsgroup" in these notes.
Another newsgroup that often has useful information on it is:
microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs
(it deals almost entirely with Word for Windows and is often not specific to long documents although it's usually consistent with the material in the notes you are now reading; most discussion is highly relevant to Mac versions and Mac-capable people answer questions there)
Similarly, microsoft.public.word.docmanagement can be useful.
There are many other specialised Word newsgroups in the "microsoft.public" series, including one for beginners (microsoft.public.word.newusers).
Before you send a query to any of these newsgroups, be sure to read the advice at:
http://www.mvps.org/word/FindHelp/Posting.htm
Also, bear in mind that discussions go through "phases". If little of what's discussed interests you now, next week's discussions may be quite different.
The following sites also have good advice, albeit about the Windows versions, and most have e-mailed newsletters:
http://home.zebra.net/~sbarnhill/GettingStarted.htm (if you don't find the article here,
it will probably have been moved to the mvps.org/word website)
the Editorium website (www.editorium.com)
&emdash; and back issues of their newsletter are listed at:
http://www.topica.com/lists/editorium/read/message.html?mid=1711556383
Woody's Watch (http://www.woodyswatch.com/office/index.asp)
Woody's Watch for Mere Mortals, with an emphasis on beginners and intermediate users of Word (http://www.woodyswatch.com/wowmm/index.asp),
Charles Kenyon's website at http://addbalance.com/word/index.htm and http://addbalance.com/usersguide/index.htm
Shauna Kelly's website at http://www.shaunakelly.com
the Electric Editors site (http://www.electriceditors.net/).
In considering which newsgroups to visit, which books to buy, or these notes, don't be too concerned about the differences between Word on the Mac and on the PC; they are very similar. See the notes under "PCs and Macs, main differences in Word interfaces" on page 86.
There are several ways to gain access to a newsgroup using newsreader software or a web browser.
There are many good specialised newsreader software applications that you can use. Unfortunately I can't give advice on them because I now use Microsoft Outlook Express e-mail software for this purpose (only &emdash; I prefer Eudora for my e-mail). Entourage is an alternative. One advantage is that you can sort by date, subject or sender, and the postings appear in (almost) real time; neither of these facilities is available on the Web. This is how I configured Outlook Express:
o From the Tools menu I chose "Accounts". Then I opened a new News account that I called "Microsoft News Server". In the settings I included "msnews.microsoft.com" in the field titled "News server" and 300 headers at a time against "Server options".
o I clicked on Microsoft News Server in the list at the left. A very long list of newsgroups appeared. I scrolled to microsoft.public.mac.office.word, clicked on it once, then chose Edit menu » Subscribe. Then I clicked the triangular arrow to the left of the "Microsoft News Server" folder to display the name of this newsgroup on the line below it.
o Each time I open Outlook Express, I click on this newsgroup in the list at the left.
o I did the same with the microsoft.public.word.formatting.longdocs newsgroup.
Fuller instructions are at http://www.entourage.mvps.org/help/start.html#Anchor-newsgroup (the example shows Entourage, which is similar).
(Before you post a question on the newsgroup, it's best to do a search of previous questions via Google's search engine, as shown below.)
There are several ways to use a web browser to go to the newsgroup's postings. To go direct, use this address:
Many people using their web browser prefer the display of newsgroup postings presented by the Google search engine &emdash; although there can be delays of a day or more before postings are displayed, which can be a nuisance if you have asked a question that needs an urgent reply or you otherwise participated in a discussion, because discussion can get out of step. This is the URL for a Google search of the microsoft.public.mac.office.word newsgroup:
http://groups.google.com/groups?safe=images&ie=ISO-8859-1&as_ugroup=microsoft.public.mac.office.word
Before you post a question on the newsgroup, search for previous discussions of this topic
Every usenet post from non-binary groups is stored indefinitely on the Google search engine website. So it's easy, before posting a question to check for queries on your topic that have been fully discussed before. Use your web browser to go to Google's advanced search (http://www.google.com/advanced_group_search?hl=en):
o In the field against "Return only messages from the newsgroup", key in "microsoft.public.mac.office.word" or another newsgroup.
o Fill in the other fields as required. For instance, if you want to get some advice on printing to PDF, put "printing PDF" in the "with all the words" field. If you want to find only what John McGhie had to say about that topic, put "John McGhie" in the author field.
o Then click on the "Google search" button.
o Especially useful is the "View whole thread" option once you have selected a likely looking topic.
Make sure that the discussions are relevant to your version of Word. Nowadays, much of the discussion relates to problems in Word X that don't occur in Word 2001 and earlier, and people often don't mention the version they are asking about.
Clive Huggan