YOURS TRULEIGH EDITING

  • Home
  • Services
  • Portfolio
  • Testimonials
  • Contact
  • Blog

15/12/2020

Macro baby steps part i

2 Comments

Read Now
 
One of the many excellent session at this year's CIEP's conference was 'Macros for beginners', presented by Karen Cox, in which Karen introduced a selection of Paul Beverley's macros. Kate Sotejeff-Wilson reviews the session in this blog post and I know that the session inspired many people to see if using macros could help them, even though for many people this step can be daunting.
I'm a huge fan of macros and I use several of the macros described in the session and many of Paul's other macros (along with a few written by other people). When I encourage people to take the plunge into the world of macros (which, as my local CIEP group will tell you, is quite a frequent occurrence) I usually suggest starting off by trying a very simple macro of the kind that, once installed (see here for how to install a macro) and allocated to a keyboard shortcut, is used in the same way as more familiar keyboard shortcuts (such as CTRL-C and CTRL-V), and, importantly, can be undone using CTRL-Z! These small macros can perform functions such as toggling the case of the next word, swapping letters/characters or words, or typing frequently used words, eg 'that'. (If you use Paul's macros, these macros are called: CaseNextWord, SwapCharacters, SwapWords, TypeThat; other macros are available.) 

Additionally, you can use Word's 'Record Macro' function (on the Developer tab) to create your own macros to help you with those repetitive tasks that crop up in your own work, but you can't find a macro to help with.
Picture
​Recording your own macro sounds terrifying … but can be quite easy … and anything you create is easy to delete if it doesn't work. Sometimes, you can even edit them, but that doesn't always go too well! 

One of the journals that I edit for requires all author names in the text to appear in small caps, so I recorded my own macro to change the selected text (ie the author name) to small caps. It's a silly little macro, but it saves me a couple of mouse clicks each time I use it. (I use it in combination with PerfectIt's 'Phrases to look out for' where I have listed 'et al.' and 'colleagues' to help me find the author names).

​If I accidentally select another word, I can undo what the macro has done using CTRL-Z. Undoing what a macro has done may well take a couple more clicks that you imagine as even simple macros often involve a couple of steps that your computer does so quickly that you don't notice them, but the important thing is that you can undo the macro's effects very quickly.

For the same journal, I recorded another macro to change '[disease name] patients' to 'patients with [disease name]' once I have I have selected the disease name in question The macro merely cuts the selected text, moves it forward one word, types 'with' and pastes the selected text. Again, it’s a trivial macro (all of seven lines long including titles etc), but it saves me a bit of typing every time I use it.

​I will show you how I recorded this macro in the next blog post.

Author

Andrea at Yours Truleigh Editing.
www.yourstruleighediting.com

Picture

Archives

January 2021
December 2020

Categories

All
CIEP
Editorial Training
Macros
StetSwim
Working With Word

Share

2 Comments
Karen Cox link
17/12/2020 10:21:35

Thanks for the mention, Andrea! I'm delighted that you're a fellow macro enthusiast, and that you found my conference session useful.

Reply
Andrea Kay
17/12/2020 17:10:06

You're welcome, Karen.

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

Details

    Author

    Andrea at Yours Truleigh Editing
    I'm an editor based on the south coast of the United Kingdom. I try and use the tools at my disposal to make the process of editing as effiicient and accurate as possible and I'm hoping to share some tips and techniques that I've picked up along the way. I'm an enthusiastic and grateful member of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading. Editorial freelancers benefit hugely from being part of supportive organisations:  for direct support for our work, such as training and providing routes for our clients to find us, but also for community, which is needed now more than ever.  

    Archives

    January 2021
    December 2020

    Categories

    All
    CIEP
    Editorial Training
    Macros
    StetSwim
    Working With Word

    RSS Feed

Dr Andrea Kay
​Medical Editor | ​Yours Truleigh Editing

© COPYRIGHT 2021. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Services
  • Portfolio
  • Testimonials
  • Contact
  • Blog