Special Symbols Followed by a Non-Breaking Space

For legal writing, Tony often needs to use section symbols, pilcrows, and ellipses. For ellipses, he requires three periods with a space before the first period, between each period, and after the last period, consistent with his organization's style guide. Tony would like to find a quick way to enter these symbols followed a non-breaking space after the symbol. Other than recording a macro, he wonders if there is any other way to do this.

Without resorting to macros, there are two primary methods you can use to accomplish this task. One is to use AutoCorrect and the other is to create Building Blocks. Either will do, but you may want to use AutoCorrect if you want your special symbols to be available in other Microsoft Office applications.

Using AutoCorrect

There are three things that Tony wants to handle: Section symbols, pilcrows, and ellipses. Here's how you would set up all three as AutoCorrect entries:

1. Display the Word Options dialog box. (In Word 2007 click the Office button and then click Word Options. In Word 2010 and later versions display the File tab of the ribbon and then click Options.)
2. Click Proofing at the left side of the screen.
3. Click AutoCorrect Options. Word displays the AutoCorrect tab of the AutoCorrect dialog box. (See Figure 1.)



Figure 1. The AutoCorrect tab of the AutoCorrect dialog box.

4. In the Replace box, enter some characters you want to trigger the insertion of a section mark. For instance, enter "_s" (without the quote marks).
5. In the With box, press Alt+0167 using the numeric keypad. The section mark character should appear.
6. With the insertion point still right after the section mark in the With box, press Ctrl+Shift+Space. This adds a non-breaking space.
7. Click Add.
8. In the Replace box, enter some characters you want to trigger the insertion of a pilcrow. For instance, enter "_p" (without the quote marks).
9. In the With box, press Alt+0182 using the numeric keypad. The pilcrow character should appear.
10. With the insertion point still right after the pilcrow in the With box, press Ctrl+Shift+Space. This adds a non-breaking space.
11. Click Add.
12. In the Replace box, type three periods.
13. In the With box, enter the characters you want used for your ellipsis, including any spaces or non-breaking spaces (Ctrl+Shift+Space).
14. Click Add.
15. Click on OK to close the AutoCorrect dialog box.

Make special note of the "Replace" characters you used in steps 4, 8, and 12. These are what you should type, and as soon as you type a space or a punctuation mark after those characters, Word will replace them with the corresponding entries you made in the "With" box (steps 5, 9, and 13).

Using Building Blocks

Creating a Building Block is an easy process. Here's how you would create one for the section mark:

1. In a document, type the section mark (Alt+0167) followed by a non-breaking space (Ctrl+Shift+Space).
2. Select the section mark and the non-breaking space. (Make sure you don't select anything beyond the end of these two characters.)
3. Press Alt+F3. Word displays the Create New Building Block dialog box. (See Figure 2.)



Figure 2. The Create New Building Block dialog box.

4. Replace the contents of the Name field with a short mnemonic you want to use for your section mark, such as "_s" (without the quote marks).
5. Use the Gallery drop-down list to choose AutoText.
6. Click on OK.

Repeat these same steps for the pilcrow (Alt+0182) and for your ellipses. In step 4, use mnemonics that are appropriate to the Building Blocks you are creating, such as "_p" for the pilcrow and "_e" for the ellipses, both without quote marks.

To later use the Building Blocks, type the mnemonic you specified in step 4 and then press F3.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (13297) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, Word in Microsoft 365, and 2021.