Better bookmarks

Bookmarks in a document let you jump to a particular location instantly, but not only can you bookmark a page, you can also go to a point in the text or a range of text, as well as automate documents with macros and fields.

To create a bookmark in Word 2003 and earlier, place the insertion point where you want the bookmark, or select a range of text you want to bookmark then click Insert, Bookmark. Openoffice Writer is much the same. In Word 2007 the Bookmark command is on the Insert ribbon ­ give the bookmark a name and press Add. A bookmark name must start with a letter and, although it can contain numbers, it cannot contain spaces or punctuation other than underscores.

Although bookmarks don’t print, you can make them visible ­ in 2007, that’s in Word Options, Advanced, Show Document Content and in earlier versions in Tools, Options, View. They’ll appear as a pair of grey, square brackets round the bookmarked text. This is an enclosed bookmark. If no text is selected the brackets superimpose to form an I-beam shape ­ a placeholder bookmark.

Openoffice doesn’t seem to have a way to make bookmarks visible, though the Navigator gives a non-modal (open all the time) list of bookmarks in a document. Click on an entry in the Navigator bookmark list and the bookmarked text will be highlighted in the document.

So what can you do with bookmarked text? The obvious use is in navigation. You can jump to a bookmark either from the Insert Bookmark dialogue or the Edit, Go To command. Openoffice users can also use the Navigator. The Word Insert Bookmark dialogue has a ‘Hidden bookmarks’ checkbox. This doesn’t hide your own bookmarks (though you can add hidden bookmarks with a macro), but hides or shows the bookmarks Word uses, such as table of contents entries and captions.

You can use bookmarks to create cross-references in a document. Select some text, a person’s name, for example, then Insert, Bookmark and name it, ‘name’. Now go elsewhere in the document and Insert, Reference, Cross-reference (Insert, Links, Cross-reference in 2007). In ‘Reference type:’ choose Bookmark and in ‘Insert reference to:’ choose Bookmark text, then choose a bookmark from the list. This will insert the bookmarked text at the current position.

If you create a hyperlink when you do this, when you click (or Control and click, depending on your Word options settings) you will be taken to the original bookmark.