Find Super/Sub script (XP)

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Hi,

I have been doing a Find for any superscipt or subscript characters, and have been using the Find Dialog box, then clicking super/sub script in the Font properties of the box. I wanted to automate this into a macro I had and so recorded my activity as a macro. It didn’t seem to record the super/sub script bit though

I have used this VBA as an alterrnative, which others may find useful, unless there is a better way using the Find method that I can’t ‘find’!

‘check for superscript / subscript characters and if present show warning
Dim i As Integer, blnF As Boolean
For i = 1 To ActiveDocument.Characters.Count
If ActiveDocument.Characters(i).Font.Subscript = True Or _
ActiveDocument.Characters(i).Font.Superscript = True Then
blnF = True
End If
Next i
If blnF Then MsgBox “There are superscript or subscript characters ” & _
“present in this document!” , vbInformation, _
“Reformat”

Cheers

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Replies

For some reason, finding font formatting is not recorded in a macro, but you can write the necessary code yourself:

With Selection.Find
.ClearFormatting
.Format = True
.Font.SuperScript = True
…
.Execute
End With

You must create separate searches for Superscript and for Subscript, the Find object does not support “find superscript or subscript”.

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Aha! Thank u Hans. That makes sense (the code – not why the macro doesn’t record it!)

And it will be quicker than my VBA as I found it takes agaes on long documents!

Cheers…

Reply | Quote

Aha! Thank u Hans. That makes sense (the code – not why the macro doesn’t record it!)

And it will be quicker than my VBA as I found it takes agaes on long documents!

Cheers…

Reply | Quote

For some reason, finding font formatting is not recorded in a macro, but you can write the necessary code yourself:

With Selection.Find
.ClearFormatting
.Format = True
.Font.SuperScript = True
…
.Execute
End With

You must create separate searches for Superscript and for Subscript, the Find object does not support “find superscript or subscript”.

Reply | Quote

Hans has pointed you in the right direction on this one, but as a sidebar, there are times when your initial approach may be useful or even necessary. When that happens, there’s a few things you can do to speed up your code.

For example, when using Find/Replace, you can search for Highlighting, but you can’t specify which color. So if you’ve got a document that uses red and blue highlighting, and you only want to clear the red highlighting, you’re in a bind. It can be done using the Find object, but it’s much easier to code (and understand) if you use a simple For…Each loop, which is is much faster than a regular For…Next loop.

To solve our hypothetical highlighting problem:

Sub RemoveOnlyRedHighlighting()
Dim char As Range
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters
    If char.HighlightColorIndex = wdRed Then
        char.HighlightColorIndex = wdNoHighlight
    End If
Next char
End Sub

In general, use a For…Each loop when you’ll be visiting each object in a collection of objects, as long as you’re not deleting any of them.

This wouldn’t be as fast as using the Find object, but its performance is respectable, considering it hits each character. And it’s got the added benefit of being simple to code — a similar macro using the Find object would be about three times as long.

To see how much faster a For…Each loop is, try this version of your original code:

Sub AnySuperOrSubScripts()
Dim char As Range
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters
    If (char.Font.Subscript) Or _
        (char.Font.Superscript) Then
        MsgBox "There are superscript or subscript characters " & _
               "present in this document!", vbInformation, _
               "Reformat"
        Exit For
    End If
Next char
End Sub

Since you just wanted to know if there were any sub/super script, this version stops as soon as it finds any.
BTW, just like the Find object, this method won’t catch items in the Header/Footer, or in Footnotes, Comments, etc.

Just my $.02

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Cheers Andrew77, thats cool. I did do a for each loop before, but didnt know what to declare the character variable as, so used a variant, ie:

Dim char As Variant
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters…

and this was quite slow.

Very helpful

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Im back on this … I have modified my code and some of the MS Word Examples code to give me a method of identifying how many superscript and subscript characters there are in my document using the FIND method. I am checking first for super, then for sub. It works for the first check, but then the FIND doesn’t reset to pick up the second set. If I comment out the first check then the FIND picks up the second.

I think its to do with the ActiveDocument.Content.Find part, I have tried a few things, but don’t know how to tell FIND to start again from the beginning! Any ideas? Should I ‘End With’ each section, or is there another way I’m missing!?

See code below: (the comment is where i imagine i do this resetting thing…)

Dim intSub As Integer, intSuper As Integer

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Superscript = True
Do While .Execute(“?”, , , , , , True) = True
intSuper = intSuper + 1
Loop

ActiveDocument.Content.MoveStart ‘this doesnt work, what can i put here??
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Subscript = True
Do While .Execute(“?”, , , , , , True) = True
intSub = intSub + 1
Loop
End With

If intSuper > 0 Or intSub > 0 Then
MsgBox “There are superscript or subscript characters ” & _
“present in this document!” & vbNewLine & _
“Superscript” & vbTab & intSuper & vbNewLine & _
“Subscript ” & vbTab & intSub & vbNewLine & _
“Make sure you reformat when in template.” _
, vbInformation, “Reformat”
End If

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I have done this for now which works well and seems ‘neat code’

Dim intSub As Integer, intSuper As Integer

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Superscript = True ‘check for superscript
Do While .Execute(FindText:=”?”, Forward:=True) = True
intSuper = intSuper + 1
Loop
End With

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Subscript = True ‘check for subscript
Do While .Execute(FindText:=”?”, Forward:=True) = True
intSub = intSub + 1
Loop
End With

Reply | Quote

I have done this for now which works well and seems ‘neat code’

Dim intSub As Integer, intSuper As Integer

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Superscript = True ‘check for superscript
Do While .Execute(FindText:=”?”, Forward:=True) = True
intSuper = intSuper + 1
Loop
End With

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Subscript = True ‘check for subscript
Do While .Execute(FindText:=”?”, Forward:=True) = True
intSub = intSub + 1
Loop
End With

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You could also do this with a variant of the CountWord macro on the MVPS web site (look about half way down the page).

StuartR

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Thanks Stuart, I like that!

My method is pretty fast, so I will keep it for now, but the macro you shown is clever. Food for thought for me

Reply | Quote

Thanks Stuart, I like that!

My method is pretty fast, so I will keep it for now, but the macro you shown is clever. Food for thought for me

Reply | Quote

You could also do this with a variant of the CountWord macro on the MVPS web site (look about half way down the page).

StuartR

Reply | Quote

Im back on this … I have modified my code and some of the MS Word Examples code to give me a method of identifying how many superscript and subscript characters there are in my document using the FIND method. I am checking first for super, then for sub. It works for the first check, but then the FIND doesn’t reset to pick up the second set. If I comment out the first check then the FIND picks up the second.

I think its to do with the ActiveDocument.Content.Find part, I have tried a few things, but don’t know how to tell FIND to start again from the beginning! Any ideas? Should I ‘End With’ each section, or is there another way I’m missing!?

See code below: (the comment is where i imagine i do this resetting thing…)

Dim intSub As Integer, intSuper As Integer

With ActiveDocument.Content.Find
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Superscript = True
Do While .Execute(“?”, , , , , , True) = True
intSuper = intSuper + 1
Loop

ActiveDocument.Content.MoveStart ‘this doesnt work, what can i put here??
.ClearFormatting
.MatchWildcards = True
.Font.Subscript = True
Do While .Execute(“?”, , , , , , True) = True
intSub = intSub + 1
Loop
End With

If intSuper > 0 Or intSub > 0 Then
MsgBox “There are superscript or subscript characters ” & _
“present in this document!” & vbNewLine & _
“Superscript” & vbTab & intSuper & vbNewLine & _
“Subscript ” & vbTab & intSub & vbNewLine & _
“Make sure you reformat when in template.” _
, vbInformation, “Reformat”
End If

Reply | Quote

Cheers Andrew77, thats cool. I did do a for each loop before, but didnt know what to declare the character variable as, so used a variant, ie:

Dim char As Variant
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters…

and this was quite slow.

Very helpful

Reply | Quote

Hans has pointed you in the right direction on this one, but as a sidebar, there are times when your initial approach may be useful or even necessary. When that happens, there’s a few things you can do to speed up your code.

For example, when using Find/Replace, you can search for Highlighting, but you can’t specify which color. So if you’ve got a document that uses red and blue highlighting, and you only want to clear the red highlighting, you’re in a bind. It can be done using the Find object, but it’s much easier to code (and understand) if you use a simple For…Each loop, which is is much faster than a regular For…Next loop.

To solve our hypothetical highlighting problem:

Sub RemoveOnlyRedHighlighting()
Dim char As Range
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters
    If char.HighlightColorIndex = wdRed Then
        char.HighlightColorIndex = wdNoHighlight
    End If
Next char
End Sub

In general, use a For…Each loop when you’ll be visiting each object in a collection of objects, as long as you’re not deleting any of them.

This wouldn’t be as fast as using the Find object, but its performance is respectable, considering it hits each character. And it’s got the added benefit of being simple to code — a similar macro using the Find object would be about three times as long.

To see how much faster a For…Each loop is, try this version of your original code:

Sub AnySuperOrSubScripts()
Dim char As Range
For Each char In ActiveDocument.Characters
    If (char.Font.Subscript) Or _
        (char.Font.Superscript) Then
        MsgBox "There are superscript or subscript characters " & _
               "present in this document!", vbInformation, _
               "Reformat"
        Exit For
    End If
Next char
End Sub

Since you just wanted to know if there were any sub/super script, this version stops as soon as it finds any.
BTW, just like the Find object, this method won’t catch items in the Header/Footer, or in Footnotes, Comments, etc.

Just my $.02

Reply | Quote