Missing Tab Selector button and missing hanging indent marker

Question

For some reason in the last couple of days, the Tab Selector button and hanging indent marker display sporadically. If I close Word and start with a blank file, they are back. In particular, there is one document I'm working on in which this behavior happens sporadically. I have to make sure that document is closed, close all Word files, reopen, and then the markers are back. Any idea what might be causing this?

Answer 1

There is an issue causing tab stops and indent indicators to disappear from the ruler in Word 2013. The problem is being investigated by the Office team, and a fix is expected. Meanwhile, the following are workarounds recommended by Microsoft:

• Start Word first, with a blank document, and then open the document you are going to read or edit.​
• Avoid having a table as the first item in a document (at present it appears that this is the cause of the problem).

While other procedures may clear the problem temporarily, none is a permanent fix, and they do not address the underlying problem issue.

Answer 2

I've got the solution!

In your Word 2013 document:

Click on File

Click on Options

Click on Customize Ribbon

Top right scroll down menu will say Main Tags. Change this to All Tabs.

Click Ok.

Voila!

Answer 3

As I said once before, it works because all you have to do is open Word Options and click on OK. Changing to All Tabs is irrelevant.

Answer 4

Well, after searching through the community on this issue, I have yet to see a "real" resolution to the problem.  However, in my case, I have found a specific instance of my document that causes the problem whether in an older version or the latest 2013 version of Word.

I found that having a table as the very first feature (as opposed to character) in my document causes the indent markers to disapper upon save, close and re-opening the document.  By simply adding a blank line or any other character in front the tabe the indent markers return upon save, close and re-open.

Again, I've replicated this even by creating a new document and new table and this works consistently.  The problem clearly has more to do with a bug in the program then it does with some system setting such as display hardware acceleration or dell windows scheme.  So, until MS fixes this bug, the work around, in my case, is to not have a table as the very first feature of a document.

By the way, this also applies to documents with a header.  It does not seem to matter what is in the header (table or regular text).  As long as a table is the first feature of the main body of the document, the indicators dissappear.

I hope, if MS, has resolved this someone can point me to the fix.

Thanks,

-Kevin

Answer 5

See reply to your duplicate post in http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/office/forum/office_2013_release-word/word-tab-indicator-missing/8e8dc131-10ed-4587-be17-a5c12cb449f7.