offset ms word page numbers

i have a document automation process that gets run in access through VBA. i'm trying to insert a fax cover sheet that is custom to the record being merged with access. all the merging and automation is fine. my problem is this: the fax cover sheet goes at the beginning of the document (naturally), so this means that the rest of the document (the main document or report) is offset by one page. i have page numbers in the header of the report that get offset (so pg 2 or the report is 3 and so on). of course it's page 3 in the word document as a whole, but for a fax transmission it is intended to be page 2. is there a way that i can mark the first page as a cover page and have it not count as a page for the auto page number? as in, can i offset the pages after the first page by (-1). please help, i hope there's a way to do this. thanks!

Originally Posted by laxonator

is there a way that i can mark the first page as a cover page and have it not count as a page for the auto page number? as in, can i offset the pages after the first page by (-1). please help, i hope there's a way to do this. thanks!

Hi laxonator,

Reducing the page number by one is actually quite easy to do. If you select your document's page number field and press Shift-F9, its field code should expand to give you something like:
{PAGE}
If you select the whole of this field and press Ctrl-F9, you'll enclose the existing field inside a new one, with the coding looking like:
{ {PAGE} }
Note: You cannot simply type these braces in - they must be input as described.
Edit the field to look like:
{={PAGE}-1}
If you now press F9 to update the result, your page numbers will be reduced by one and your cover page will now display a zero. So, we need to make one more modification to suppress the 0 display. That is, we need to add a numeric picture switch. To do this, modify the field so that it looks like:
{={PAGE}-1 \# 0;;}

Numeric picture switches accept three display options: +ve, -ve and 0, each separated by a semi-colon. Here, the '0;;' tells Word to display +ve values only, as unformatted values.

If you now press F9 to update the result, your page numbers will be reduced by one and your cover page will not display the zero.

Cheers
PS: I hope this is better late than never ...

Hi laxonator

laxonator wrote:
i have a document automation process that gets run in access through
VBA. i'm trying to insert a fax cover sheet that is custom to the
record being merged with access. all the merging and automation is
fine. my problem is this: the fax cover sheet goes at the beginning of
the document (naturally), so this means that the rest of the document
(the main document or report) is offset by one page. i have page
numbers in the header of the report that get offset (so pg 2 or the
report is 3 and so on). of course it's page 3 in the word document as
a whole, but for a fax transmission it is intended to be page 2. is
there a way that i can mark the first page as a cover page and have it
not count as a page for the auto page number? as in, can i offset the
pages after the first page by (-1). please help, i hope there's a way
to do this. thanks!

See macropod's answer.

I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW: If the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with PAGE -1
etc.

An alternative would comprise of a couple of steps: using a section
break to divide the cover page from the rest of the document, ensuring
that the page numbers in section 2 start where they should , _and_
you'll want to unlink _all_ (6) possible headers/footers from section 2
from the previous section.

2cents
Robert
--
/"\ ASCII Ribbon Campaign | MS
\ / | MVP
X Against HTML | for
/ \ in e-mail & news | Word

Originally Posted by Robert M. Franz (RMF)

Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW: If the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with PAGE -1
etc.

Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine for the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same technique could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs which, I admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers

When there's just one page to be skipped, you can accomplish all of this by
setting page numbering to start from 0.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...

Robert M. Franz (RMF) Wrote:
Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW: If
the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with PAGE
-1
etc.



Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine for
the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same technique
could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs which, I
admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number
problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers


--
macropod

Hi Suzanne,

Yes, that's true, but I believe the intention was to suppress the 0 and only
have the 'attachment' pages numbered.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
When there's just one page to be skipped, you can accomplish all of this
by
setting page numbering to start from 0.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...

Robert M. Franz (RMF) Wrote:
Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW: If
the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with PAGE
-1
etc.



Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine for
the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same technique
could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs which, I
admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number
problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers


--
macropod

Am I missing something? If the OP wants numbering to start at 1 on page 2,
then starting numbering at 0 and omitting a { PAGE } field on the first
(cover, title) page should do the trick. Obviously, this works only in this
case; for cases where there are several pages before numbering starts at 1,
this won't help. But this does avoid a section break.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...
Hi Suzanne,

Yes, that's true, but I believe the intention was to suppress the 0 and
only
have the 'attachment' pages numbered.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
When there's just one page to be skipped, you can accomplish all of this
by
setting page numbering to start from 0.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...

Robert M. Franz (RMF) Wrote:
Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW: If
the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with
PAGE
-1
etc.



Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine for
the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same technique
could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs which, I
admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number
problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers


--
macropod

Hi Suzanne,

Presumably, then, one would have to set the document up with a 'different
1st page'. So, yes, that is a valid alternative way of achieving a similar
result.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
Am I missing something? If the OP wants numbering to start at 1 on page 2,
then starting numbering at 0 and omitting a { PAGE } field on the first
(cover, title) page should do the trick. Obviously, this works only in
this
case; for cases where there are several pages before numbering starts at
1,
this won't help. But this does avoid a section break.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...
Hi Suzanne,

Yes, that's true, but I believe the intention was to suppress the 0 and
only
have the 'attachment' pages numbered.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
When there's just one page to be skipped, you can accomplish all of
this
by
setting page numbering to start from 0.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in
message
...

Robert M. Franz (RMF) Wrote:
Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not
really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else. IOW:
If
the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a
PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with
PAGE
-1
etc.



Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine
for
the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same
technique
could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs which,
I
admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number
problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers


--
macropod

Yes, unless one has used Insert | Page Numbers, which allows for skipping
the first page.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...
Hi Suzanne,

Presumably, then, one would have to set the document up with a 'different
1st page'. So, yes, that is a valid alternative way of achieving a similar
result.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
Am I missing something? If the OP wants numbering to start at 1 on page
2,
then starting numbering at 0 and omitting a { PAGE } field on the first
(cover, title) page should do the trick. Obviously, this works only in
this
case; for cases where there are several pages before numbering starts at
1,
this won't help. But this does avoid a section break.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in message
...
Hi Suzanne,

Yes, that's true, but I believe the intention was to suppress the 0
and
only
have the 'attachment' pages numbered.

Cheers


"Suzanne S. Barnhill" wrote in message
...
When there's just one page to be skipped, you can accomplish all of
this
by
setting page numbering to start from 0.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the
newsgroup
so
all may benefit.

"macropod" wrote in
message
...

Robert M. Franz (RMF) Wrote:
Hi laxonator


I could see one danger with this approach though: It does not
really
change the page numbers, but simply displays something else.
IOW:
If
the
document has a TOC, or any cross-reference to a page number, the
reference will be "off": it will still point you to whatever a
PAGE
field would show on such a page, and not what you calculate with
PAGE
-1
etc.



Hi Robert, while that's certainly true, it'll generally work fine
for
the case laxonator described. For cross-references, the same
technique
could be applied to any PAGEREF fields. That only leaves TOCs
which,
I
admit, can't be corrected in this way. In fact the TOC page number
problem is one I've pointed out in other threads/forums.

Cheers


--
macropod