Invisible formatting marks in Microsoft Word. Change the contents of a cell Exit edit mode
You can change the contents of a cell directly in the cell. In addition, you can change the contents of a cell by entering text in the formula bar.
When you edit the contents of a cell, Excel is in edit mode. Some Excel features work differently or are not available in edit mode.
When Excel is in edit mode, a message appears in the lower left corner of the Excel program window. Edit Word as shown in the figure below.
How does Excel work differently in edit mode?
Many commands are not available in edit mode. For example, when Excel is in edit mode, you cannot apply conditional formatting or change the alignment of cell content.
Also, if Excel is in edit mode, the arrow keys work differently. Instead of moving the cursor between cells in edit mode, the arrow keys move the cursor into a cell.
Enabling and disabling edit mode
If nothing happens when you try to use edit mode, it may be disabled. You can enable or disable edit mode by changing the Excel setting.
Switching to edit mode
To get started in edit mode, do one of the following:
Double-click the cell containing the data you want to change.
Edit mode will start and the cursor will be placed in the cell at the location you double-click. The contents of the cell are also displayed in the formula bar.
Click the cell that contains the data you want to change, and then click anywhere in the formula bar.
Edit mode will start and the cursor will be placed in the formula bar at the selected location.
Click the cell containing the data you want to change, and then press F2.
Edit mode will start and the cursor will be placed at the end of the cell content.
Insert, delete, and replace cell content
To insert characters, click the cell where you want to paste, and then enter new characters.
To delete characters, click the cell you want to delete into and then press the BACKSPACE key, or select the characters and then press the DELETE key.
To replace certain characters, select them and enter new characters.
To enable replace mode so that existing characters are replaced with new characters as you type, press the INSERT key.
Note: Replace mode can only be enabled or disabled in edit mode. When overwrite mode is enabled, the character to the right of the insertion point is highlighted in the formula bar and it will be overwritten as you type.
To start a new line of text at a specific point in a cell, click where you want to break the line, and then press Alt+Enter.
Cancel or Revert Changes
Before pressing the ENTER or TAB key and before or after pressing the F2 key, you can press the ESC key to undo any changes made to the contents of the cell.
After you press the ENTER or TAB key, you can undo your changes by pressing CTRL+Z or the cancel on the quick access panels.
Change how cell contents are displayed
After changing the contents of a cell, you may need to adjust how they are displayed.
Exit edit mode
To stop working in edit mode, do one of the following:
Compliance with spelling is one of the key rules when working with text documents. The point here is not only in grammar or writing style, but also in the correct formatting of the text as a whole. To check whether you spaced the intervals between paragraphs correctly, whether you put extra spaces or tabs in MS Word, hidden formatting marks or, more simply, invisible characters will help.
In practice, it is not always possible to determine from the first time where in the document an accidental repeated keystroke was used "TAB" or double pressing the spacebar instead of one. Just non-printable characters (hidden formatting characters) allow you to identify "problem" places in the text. These characters are not printed or displayed in the document by default, but enabling them and setting display options is very easy.
To enable hidden formatting marks in the text, you need to click only one button. It's called "Show all signs", but is in the tab "Home" in the tool group "Paragraph".
You can enable this mode not only with the mouse, but also with the help of the keys "CTRL+*" on keyboard. To turn off the display of invisible characters, just press the same key combination or the button on the quick access toolbar again.
Setting the display of hidden characters
By default, when this mode is active, all hidden formatting marks are displayed. If you turn it off, all those characters that are marked in the settings of the program itself will be hidden. At the same time, it is possible to make some of the signs always visible. Hidden characters are configured in the Options section.
1. Open the Quick Access Toolbar tab "File" and then go to section "Parameters".
2. Select an item "Screen" and set the necessary checkboxes in the section "Always show these formatting marks on the screen".
Note: Formatting marks with checkmarks next to them will always be visible, even when the mode is disabled "Show all signs".
Hidden formatting marks
In the MS Word options section discussed above, you could see what invisible characters are. Let's take a closer look at each of them.
Tabs
This non-printing character allows you to see the location in the document where the key was pressed. "TAB". It is displayed as a small arrow pointing to the right. For more details, see the tabulation in text editor from Microsoft you can in our article.
Space character
Spaces are also non-printable characters. When enabled "Show all signs" they look like miniature dots located between words. One dot - one space, therefore, if there are more dots, an error was made during typing - the space was pressed twice, or even more times.
In addition to the usual space, you can also put a non-breaking space in Word, which can be useful in many situations. This hidden sign looks like a miniature circle located at the top of the line. More details about what this sign is, and why it may be needed at all, is written in our article.
paragraph mark
The symbol "pi", which, by the way, is depicted on the button "Show all signs", represents the end of a paragraph. This is the location in the document where the key was pressed. "ENTER". Immediately after this hidden character, a new paragraph begins, the cursor pointer is placed at the beginning of the new line.
A piece of text located between two pi signs, this is a paragraph. The properties of this piece of text can be adjusted independently of the properties of the rest of the text in the document or the rest of the paragraphs. These properties include alignment, spacing between lines and paragraphs, numbering, and a number of other parameters.
Line translation
The newline character is displayed as a curved arrow, exactly the same as drawn on the key "ENTER" on keyboard. This symbol indicates the place in the document where a line breaks and the text continues on a new (next) line. Forced line feed can be added using the keys SHIFT+ENTER.
The properties of the newline character are similar to those of the paragraph character. the only difference is that when translating lines, new paragraphs are not detected.
Hidden text
In Word, you can hide text, we wrote about it earlier. In mode "Show all signs" hidden text is indicated by a dotted line below this very text.
If you turn off the display of hidden characters, then the hidden text itself, and with it the denoting dotted line, will also disappear.
Object binding
An object anchor symbol, or anchor as it is called, indicates a place in a document where a shape or shape has been added and then modified. graphic object. Unlike all other hidden formatting marks, it is displayed in the document by default.
End of cell
This symbol can be seen in the tables. When in a cell, it marks the end of the last paragraph within the text. Also, this symbol marks the actual end of the cell if it is empty.
That's all, now you know exactly what hidden formatting marks (invisible characters) are and why they are needed in Word.
One of the basic rules for the correct creation of documents in Word is spelling. Don't get me wrong, as this has nothing to do with grammar or writing style.
If you want Word to align text beautifully and respect the spacing between paragraphs, then you must make sure that you do not put extra spaces between words and in cells, that the beginning of paragraphs are located correctly and the indents are adjusted so that the document looks correctly formatted.
It would be very difficult to identify certain spaces or places in a document where an accidental double TAB (TAB) was used instead of one, if there were no formatting marks. These characters are non-printing characters and show us the places where the SPACE (SPACE), TAB, ENTER (ENTER) keys have been used, or where hidden text is located.
Without them, it would be almost impossible to create a document in the correct format: it will take a very long time to correct errors that interfere with the correct alignment of text and objects.
Generally, formatting marks are hidden until you make them visible by pressing ¶ on the " home» in Word (Fig. 1).
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Also, you can use keyboard shortcuts Ctrl + * or Ctrl + Shift + 8 to toggle "Show/Hide" formatting characters. Toggling the display of formatting characters has two positions:
ON - turns on display all formatting characters.
OFF - disables display formatting characters exception the ones you choose to keep visible until you change the settings. Where can I choose which formatting characters should remain visible/hidden after pressing the ¶ button?
Click the "File» , and then click "Parameters» (Fig. 2).
Fig.2
Click " Screen» and withleft, under Always show these formatting marks»choose which formatting marks you want to make always visible, even after turning it off (fig. 3).
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There are various formatting marks, or sometimes referred to as non-printing characters, in Word. Let's consider the main ones.
Space character
Dots are spaces between words. One click on the spacebar - one dot (Fig. 4).
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Paragraph character
The character (¶) represents the end of a paragraph. After this character, Word starts a new paragraph and moves the cursor to a new line (Fig. 5).
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A paragraph mark is placed in the document when a key is pressed Enter on your keyboard. The text between these two characters is defined as a paragraph and has a number of properties that can be adjusted independently from the rest of the text (or paragraphs), such as alignment (left, right, center and width), spacing before and after a paragraph, line spacing , numbering, etc.
Tab sign
Pressing TAB (TAB) is indicated by an arrow pointing to the right (Fig. 6):
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Line translation
The newline character or represents the place where the line breaks and the text continues on a new line. You can insert a newline by pressing Shift+Enter.
The function of the newline character is in many ways similar to the paragraph mark and has a similar effect, except that no new paragraphs are defined when a linefeed occurs (Figure 7).
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Hidden text
Hidden text is a dotted line below the text that is defined as hidden (Figure 8).
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When you turn off the formatting marks, the above text will look like this (Fig. 9):
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Hidden text is not printed. BUT! How to hide text? It's very simple ;)
Select the text you want to hide
Right click on the selected text and click Font (Fig. 10)
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Press " Hidden» (Fig. 11)
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Why do we need to hide the text? Primarily to customize a document or text template to meet specific requirements. You can also hide text if you don't want to print it at the moment but don't want to delete it.
We return to the formatting characters.
Anchor
An anchor is a place in the text where some object in the document has been changed and the anchor object affects the behavior this object in the text. In other words, the anchor object, like a hook or a ring, is on the back of the painting, which is used to hang the painting on the wall.
The anchor is a small icon in the form of a ship's anchor (Fig. 12).
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It has been established that in cells this sign means the end of the last paragraph in the cell or at its end. It reflects the formatting of the cell (Fig. 13).
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