In this lesson, you'll learn how to set page margins and line spacing. Word provides default margins and line spacing, but you can easily adjust them to suit your purposes.
The Ruler displayed across the top of the Word for Windows work area makes setting margins easy. You can work visually rather than thinking in terms of inches or centimeters. The Ruler is designed to be used with a mouse. To use the Ruler to change margins, you must be working in Page Layout mode (select View Page Layout).
Timesaver Tip: Displaying the Ruler If your ruler is not displayed, select View Ruler to display it.
Margin settings made with the Ruler affect the entire document. The white bar on the ruler shows the current margin settings, as shown in Figure 12.1. To change the left or right margin, point at the margin symbol on the ruler, at the left or right end of the white bar (the mouse pointer will change to a two-headed arrow). Then, drag the margin to the new position.
Plain English: Margins The left and right margins are the distances, respectively, between the text and the left and right edges of the page.
Figure 12.1
The ruler displays a white bar showing the current left and right margin settings.
Note that the margin symbols on the ruler are the vertical edges of the white margin
bar, not the small triangular buttons. These buttons are the indent symbols,
which you'll learn about in Lesson 14. If your mouse pointer has changed to a 2-headed
arrow, then you know you have found the margin symbol.
Timesaver Tip: Changing Margins To change the margins for only a portion of a document, change the left and/or right indent (covered in Lesson 14).
If you prefer not to use the ruler, or want to enter specific values, you can set the left and right margins using a dialog box. This technique also allows you to set the margins for only a part of the document:
Figure 12.2
The Page Setup dialog box with the Margins options displayed.
You also use the Page Setup dialog box to change the top and bottom margins. These margins specify the distance between text and the top and bottom of the page. As with the left and right margins, the top and bottom margin settings affect the entire document.
Timesaver Tip: Header and Footer Margins Top and bottom margins do not affect the position of headers and footers.
Line spacing controls the amount of space between lines of text. Different spacing is appropriate for different kinds of documents. If you want to print your document on as few pages as possible, use single line spacing to position lines close together. In contrast, a document that will later be edited by hand should be printed with wide line spacing to provide space for the editor to write comments. Word offers a variety of line-spacing options. If you change line spacing, it affects the selected text; if there is no text selected, it affects the current paragraph and text you type at the insertion point. To change line spacing:
Figure 12.3
The Paragraph dialog box with the Indents and Spacing options displayed.
In this lesson, you learned how to set page margins and line spacing. The next lesson
shows you how to use and set tabs.
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