Table boarder Madness! (2003)

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I am at my witts end with moving cell boarders in Word XP! What has happened in this version? Every time I move a boarder the whole table moves! Is there some trick I seem to be missing?

Kerry

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XP = 2002, not 2003.

Try first selecting the cell or cells whose borders you want to move. And make sure that Text wrapping is set to None (in the Table tab of Table | Table Properties).

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Thanks for setting me straight on the version name – I am using 2003.

The text wrapping is set to none and it still happens.

Kerry

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When you click inside a table, handles appear near the upper left and lower right corners. Avoid these – the handle near the upper left corner lets you drag the entire table to another position (setting Text wrapping to ‘Around’), and the handle near the lower right corner lets you resize the table as a whole.

If you want to move the borders of a few cells (or of a row or column), select those cells (or row or column). Dragging a border should then affect the selection only (if possible).

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I still cannot uderstand what you are wanting to do Kerry? Do you want the content of a cell moved, or the borders of the cell enlarged, or to move the formatted border of a cell to another cell? Can you be more specific in what you are having a hassle with?
Tx

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What I am finding is that when I have a table with text in it and I want to resize a cell (move the border left or right) sometimes it works and sometimes it doesnt. By not working I mean that either the whole table becomes smaller or larger or the outside border of a row moves either in or out. The trouble is, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesnt and I dont know what causes this action. I cant get it to happen consistently.

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I prefer to turn off the automatic resizing and do it all manually. I am old fashioned that way.

Table > Table Properties…, Table tab, Options… button, uncheck “Automatically resize to fit contents”

To move a column divider left or right using the ruler without resizing the entire table, hold the Shift key before and during the operation. The divider moves in some increment that I can’t recall. To position more precisely, switch to holding the Alt key.

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I had the Auto resize turned off anyway but it seems using the ruler and the shift/alt key seems to do the trick thanks!

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The incrementatl distance that the border moves seems to be related to the grid settings. These are found under Draw on the drawing toolbar.
The grid setting need to be changed if you are trying to create a consistent metric document because they (like the default tab stops) are in fractions of an inch not in cm.
Here is the macro I use on each new Word installion.

Sub FixGridMetric()
‘ make the grid and tab stops metric

‘ FixGridMetric Macro
‘ Macro recorded 30/08/2005 by Judith McCrea
‘
With ActiveDocument
.SnapToGrid = True
.SnapToShapes = False
.GridDistanceHorizontal = CentimetersToPoints(0.1)
.GridDistanceVertical = CentimetersToPoints(0.1)
.GridSpaceBetweenHorizontalLines = 1
.GridSpaceBetweenVerticalLines = 1
.GridOriginFromMargin = True
End With
Options.DisplayGridLines = False

‘ Fix default tabs
ActiveDocument.DefaultTabStop = CentimetersToPoints(1)

End Sub

Hope this helps your understanding of what the table borders are doing.
Judith

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Hi Kerry,

You must be aware of the fact that when you size a cell, you must have the cell selected. This will influence just the dimensions of that particular cell when you drag the border left or right. If you DO NOT have the cell selected, the entire column with be sized left or right when you have the mouse pointer over the vertical border of that column.

Hope this and the other replies have cleared this up for you…

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