Find&Replace Hints
Author: CarolynB


Find&Replace Languages

You can easily spellcheck all words in Italics / Bold / Underline etc (like foreign-language book titles or quotes) with a language spellchecker other than the main text option, or even no spellcheck at all - great for footnotes. It’s also a real godsend if you have a multilanguage document and you need (e.g.) to change all the English UK spelling to English USA at the last minute. Here’s how:

Control H

Make sure your cursor is in the Find field.
Find: leave blank
Click on More / Format / Language
Select the main document language.

Move your cursor (Tab) to the Replace field.
Replace leave blank + Control I(talic) / B(old) / U(nderline) if appropriate
Make sure your cursor is in the Replace field
Click on More / Format / Language
Be careful to leave the Do not check spelling or grammar box blank;
select the language you want and click on Replace All.

Then just spellcheck as usual - but be very careful the first few times.
If you want to be extra-safe, add a color to your language choices for added clarity.


Find&Replace Words in Stand-Out Color

How often do you do a Find&Replace (Control H) and forget to tick the
Find Whole Words Only box first? I do it all the time, but no bloopers ever slip through if you COLOR your Replace options like this example:
Control H
Find: lei
Replace law

Make sure your cursor is in the Replace field

Then click on More / Format / Font / Font Color

Pick your favorite color (avoid red, blue and green, but orange or lilac are good as few original texts seem to use them) and click on Replace All.

Et voila - all your ‘lei’ are now ‘law’ (including words like brasilawro instead of brasileiro if you forgot to tick Find whole words only!) but in eye-catching color. If for any reason you skip these mistakes as you work or your spelchkr glitches, they stand out in your final review because of their color. This tip is a life-saver for large texts translated under time pressures as it’s one less potential disaster to worry about.



Find&Replace Highlights to Summarize a Text

When you have a text that is a summary of a longer job (profile x full resume, forinstance), highlight the parts you want to delete. Then:

Control H
Find: ^?
(this means any character)
Make sure your cursor is in the Find field
Then click on More / Format / Highlight

Replace leave blank
Click on Replace All.

You’re left with only the portions of the text you wanted to keep.