Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!mit-eddie!bbn!usc!elroy!peregrine!ccicpg!felix!kehr
From: kehr@felix.UUCP (Shirley Kehr)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: RSG 4 vs Word 3.0x
Message-ID: <97113@felix.UUCP>
Date: 15 May 89 14:31:52 GMT
References: <7921@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
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Reply-To: kehr@felix.UUCP (Shirley Kehr)
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In article <7921@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> fielding@geology.tn.cornell.edu writes:
<It
<seems like the ability to insert pages in the middle (our figures have to
<be interspersed) of the file and have the text flow around them is one thing
<that Word cannot do, but if I have to redo all of the formatting, it is not
<worth it.
 
Do you have Word 4.0? It flows text around positioned objects on a page.
If you insert text in front of the positioned object, it will get pushed
to subsequent pages, but be positioned in the same place on the page. You
might be able to accomplish your goals with Word 4.0.

I played around with small positioned graphics over the weekend. I was
describing the function of a key and had the graphic at the left margin.
It was positioned inline, and was the height of approximately three text
lines. If the paragraph that goes with the graphic is short, you may want
to stick with side-by-side formatting.

One problem was a paragraph heading that followed the positioned graphic
and its text. Because Word was not yet ready to start the next line at the
left margin (given the space it leaves around the object, the paragraph 
heading was pulled over to the right of the graphic. Adding an extra
carriage return put the heading back at the left margin but left too much
space between the positioned graphic and the paragraph head.

This isn't Word's fault. I just didn't have enough text to really flow 
around the graphic. Another thing that can happen with short paragraphs
trying to wrap around a graphic is that the final (short) line of a 
paragraph can end up wrapped back to the left margin and seem to be
disassociated from the rest of the paragraph that is right of the graphic.

I don't know if similar problems occur in page layout software. I just
found that I only converted some of the side-by-side paragraphs to use
positioned graphics.