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How do I get continuous page numbering that ignores section breaks

Anonymous
2014-12-03T00:52:28+00:00

I have a long document (over 200 pages) with over 360 continuous section breaks (most of these were inserted automatically when I inserted columns into the document.  How do I get continuous page numbering from beginning to end of the document without having to go into each of the sections.  ie can I tell word to ignore the sections when it comes to numbering?

FYI each section break is linked to the previous section so when I view the footer it  says 'same as previous' .  The first 17 pages (which are mostly section 1) work fine.  Then suddenly the numbering goes as follows : 2,  2,  2,  2,  3,  2  4,  5,  6,  2  ...etc - the majority of the remaining pages are numbered 2!

The document is made up of 5 documents that were cut and pasted into one, which may be part of the problem.  Is there a way to view and clear any gremlins lurking in the footer.  I have used the 'remove footer' icon to try clearing it but the same problem recurs when I try re-inserting the pg number.

Also as each page may have several continuous section breaks (columns) so 'Footer section 19'  is followed by (for instance 'Footer Section 21' -ie there is no' Footer Section 20').  Is the problem perhaps in the 'hidden' sections? 

Any suggestions welcome.

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Suzanne S Barnhill 277.5K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
2014-12-03T13:48:19+00:00

At some point, you must have restarted page numbering. Unfortunately, when you do this, then every time you insert a section break, the next section also restarts. At this point, I'm afraid that, short of removing all the section breaks and reinserting them, you have no recourse but to go into every section and change the page number format.

Since some of your sections are "landlocked" (that is, in the middle of a page, so not accessible from the header or footer), you are fortunate that Word 2010 allows you to access the Page Number Format dialog from any location. Don't bother opening the footer, since it doesn't allow you access to every section. Instead, do the following:

  1. At the bottom of the vertical scroll bar is a pair of double arrows (the browse buttons). Between them is a round Select Browse Object button. Click on this and select Browse by Section from the flyout palette.
  2. Now, starting where the page numbering goes wrong, click Insert | Header & Footer | Page Number | Format Page Number and set the numbering to "Continue from previous section." Click OK to close the dialog.
  3. Click the double down arrow (Next Section) to go to the next section and repeat step 2.
  4. Repeat steps 3 and 2 until you have corrected all the page numbering.

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  1. Doug Robbins - MVP - Office Apps and Services 323K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2017-03-14T01:31:03+00:00

    If you send me a copy of the document, referencing this thread in the covering email message, I will investigate the issue.

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-03-28T23:30:51+00:00

    Suzanne, you've been a great help to me on prior occasions, but this time  I was unable to solve my erratic page numbering problem by following your instructions shown above.  So I did it another way.

    I converted my 4 sections containing columns to tables - (without table borders the printed material looks exactly the same.)  Then I deleted all the section indicators (there are none for tables).  And wherever I had placed a "section break next page" I changed it to a simple "page break".  After this I was able to enter a footer with both text & page numbering and it worked perfectly from beginning to end of the document.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-12-12T16:12:21+00:00

    Thanks this helped.   I also discovered that another way to find the incorrect section breaks was to click on View/Outlining/and make sure that you tick the Show Text Formatting box.   Ticking the Show First Line Only box makes it easier to scroll through the document and find the section breaks that are not marked 'Section Break Continuous'.

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  4. Doug Robbins - MVP - Office Apps and Services 323K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2014-12-03T08:42:32+00:00

    Inserting a table into a document should not cause a Section Break to also be inserted and if that is the only reason that they are there, I would suggest that you use the replace facility to replace ^b with nothing.

    Or you could use a macro containing the following code to format the page numbers in each section to continue from those in the previous Section

    Dim i As Long

    With ActiveDocument

        For i = 2 To .Sections.count

            With .Sections(i).Footers(wdHeaderFooterPrimary).PageNumbers.RestartNumberingAtSection = False

        Next i

    End With

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