Page Numbers while Dragging Scroll bar

Question

While working on a long MS Word document, in prior versions I could drag the slider on the scroll bar and it would indicate which page number I was on--now that feature is gone.

How can I turn it back on? So I can simply drag the slider down, and tell when I am on, say, page 175, or 250, without having to quit dragging and click on the document?

I am using Word for Mac 2016

Answer 1

You can't "turn it back on" because it simply is not there. My guess is that it has something to do with Apple's confiscation of scroll bar behavior & windowing control.

Don't hesitate to send feedback on the matter by using the ☺︎ at the right end of Word's Ribbon.

Answer 2

I figured this out on my own, finally.

The answer is: clicking on the page numbers on the lower left corner of the open document window will open a sidebar with thumbnails of the pages, with numbering at the bottom. So that slider bar can be dragged until the appropriate thumbnail is visible, click on that page, and voila! You've accomplished in three clicks what you used to be able to do in one!

That sidebar is also available via the drop down menu View-->Sidebar-->Thumbnail. 

Macs still have the drop down menu, dunno how it would be done on a Windows machine if clicking on the "page x of x" in the bottom window border doesn't work. Haven't been able to discern how/if the sidebar can be accessed via the "ribbons," and Word in-app Help is wholly unresponsive.

BUT! If you want to know what page number you are on while scrolling/dragging the slider through a long word document in Mac Word 2016, just click on the page numbers, or View-->Sidebar-->Thumbnail. Lost functionality returned!

Answer 3

This is very frustrating and arbitrary. I really like most of the changes that were built into the 2016 version. But as an editor, I relied a lot on being able to quickly move around between pages using the scroll bar display of page numbers. Using the page thumbnails for this when you have a 20 page docuemnt is fine but when, as i often do, te manuscript is over 300 pages, it's cumbersome. Lordy, I get tired of companies—and Apple is among the worst—who change stuff for the sake of changing. I am sure some bright young person gets a nice bonus for devising such innovations and then the users suffer.

Answer 4

As you know, I mean get back the functionality of earlier versions of Word. 

I know that ten years ago I worked on a machine that had that page-number-revealing feature turned off, and I was able to turn it back on, and was hoping there was a similar preference somewhere here.

"My guess is that it has something to do with Apple's confiscation of scroll bar behavior & windowing control."

So you're saying that the feature remains intact in Word for Windows?

The Mac tabletification/anti-scroll bar arrow etc. business is indeed irritating. I liked my old Word 2003. At least in Mac Word the menu bars remain so I don't have to learn several dozen non-intuitive button-icon meanings on contextual ribbons in order to get anything done, so I guess I should be thankful.

Answer 5

AFAIK, the Elevator feature remains in the Windows versions -- at least through Office 2010. In fact, it is functional in Word 2011. It simply was dropped or omitted in Word 2016, but O2016 is an ongoing project [with a long way to go], so the feature may be restored somewhere down the road... especially if there is sufficient demand.