MS Word Legal: It's Not So Hard To Deal With Hard Space
Hard Space, Required Space, Non Breaking Space as well as Hard Hyphen, Required Hyphen, Non Breaking Hyphen…
All of the items listed in the heading above all pertain to the same thing meaning a hard space or a hard hyphen. But, in the WP center, these little items are VERY IMPORTANT.
A Hard Space simply serves to keep two items together such as John Q Smith. A hard space would be placed between the John and Q so that the Q does not separate from John and wrap around to the next line leaving the name John at the end of the line by itself. Another example is January 1, 2025. We would place the hard space between the January and the 1 so that January 1 does not separate but acts like one piece of text.
Another very common use of the Hard Space is when you have numbering all throughout a paragraph whether it is (1), (i), (a), (I) etc.
The Court noted, among other things, the following with respect to the votes: (1) one of the largest claimants had no Very Untrue Claim, (2) two creditors who had Accrued Claims and Untrue Claims voted their unsplit claims in full; (3) 16 of the 34 reinsureds who voted in favor of the Scheme were also reinsures of the Company; (4) the majority of reinsureds had no or only modest Very Untrue Claims;
In the example above, there are four sentences that are numbered, Also note that after each closed parenthesis is followed by a word that we do not want to have separate from the closed parenthesis. The hard space that we will place between the closed parenthesis and the word that follows, serves to make sure that the number such as (1) and the word following never separates so that the number (1) is not left at the end of the line and the word following wraps to the next line. That is to say that the (1) and the word that follows stay together as one piece. .
Inserting Hard Spaces as Needed.
In order to make the Hard Space first make sure that there are no regular spaces between the two items that you wish to have stay as one piece.
1.Place the cursor between the two items and use Control + Shift and tap the Space Bar 1X.
2.There should be only the hard space between the two items. If there is a hard space and a regular space it not work! When you insert a hard space it produces a degree like symbol °.
Setting Up For A Global Replace of Hard Space
Many times while working on a document in the center, you see paragraph after paragraph that needs hard space protection. If time is of the essence we can set up for a global replace.
Note: I recommend that you highlight a group of paragraphs at a time because a global will only go as far as the highlighted material. If you make an error, it will only go as far as the highlighted text. This little tidbit about the highlighting can be a life saver in avoiding document wide errors.
1. Control H. This brings up your Find and Replace Dialog Box
2. In the Find What area type in a Closed Parenthesis and a regular space. (Tap the space bar 1x)
3. In the Replace with area put in a Closed Parenthesis and Click the "More" Button followed by the "Special" Button and select Non-Breaking Space.
4. Select Replace All and all of the areas in need of hard space protection within the highlighted area. You can then decide to keep going or do the global in piecemeal as you go along.
Update: By the way, a hard hyphen is Control Shift Hyphen but for MS Word 365, you now use Alt Shift Hyphen. This will keep a hyphenated word together and it will never break apart.
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