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So I appear to be failing to understand the behavior of Word with regard to section breaks, header and footer and page numbers. I am happy to get the some clear definition on this behavior.
I assume that section breaks provide the function to be able to control the page layouts, header and footer content include page formats and numbering.
I also assume if I was to delete the page break between say section 1 and 2 that the layout and controls for Section 1 would remain constant.
So here is what I am experiencing.
Section 1 - Page number format 1, 2, 3 etc.
Section 2 - Page number format A, B, C etc.
Assumption that is if I delete separating section break page number format would remain 1,2,3 where as what actually happens is Section 1 page numbers apply A, B, C format.
This has me confused and any pointers gratefully received.
In my searches I seen a post about 'hidden' section breaks, headers and footers. Is this correct and can they be purged?
I should point out that this document is or will be a restricted document but unrestricting makes no difference to the outcome.
Chris
A family of Microsoft word processing software products for creating web, email, and print documents.
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
Before deleting the section break, enable "Different First Page" in Section 2 and make sure that the First Page Header in Section 2 is linked to the one in Section 1. You should then retain the First Page Header content when you delete the section break.
You will still need to change the Page Number Format. You didn't mention that you had Different First Page enabled. You would need to have either enabled that in Section 2 and linked the First Page Header in Section 2 to Section 1. Or you could have copied the one in Section 1 in order to paste it back after combining the sections.
Yes, it is possible to get this to function, but some changes to the procedure would have to have been made before you removed the section break.
Generally, when you delete a section break, the section-level formatting that precedes the break will be lost. You can see this clearly with column formatting, for example.
At the moment, I am not getting consistent results with page numbering formats, though. I am not sure why.
See Suzanne's reply for more details.
When you create a new section by inserting a section break, the new section inherits the formatting of the preceding section. You can then change the formatting of the new section. This is what you have done. But the section break at the end of a section controls the formatting in the section preceding it, so deleting the break between Section 1 and Section 2 does, as you have seen, cause the entire new section to use the formatting defined in Section 2. There is a way around this at least for page formatting (you will also have to link the headers and footers in Section 2 to those in Section 1 before deleting the break):
A version of this procedure is given under "Remove the 'letter'” in http://wordfaqs.ssbarnhill.com/DetachEnvelope.htm