Since you didn't say, I'll guess you're using either Word 2003 or Word 2007.
Something like the improvement you suggest is already available in Word
2007: Go to Office button Word Options Advanced, scroll down to the
"Cut, copy, and paste" section, and set the four pasting options as you
want. In each dropdown, one of the choices is "Keep text only", which causes
Word to paste unformatted text. The other paste types are still available
through Paste Special when you need them.
In the same option group, regardless of how you set the default paste type,
you can check the option "Show Paste Options buttons" (this is also
available in Word 2003 at Tools Options Edit). When this is checked,
whenever you paste you'll see a small square with the clipboard icon
floating near the pasted text. Clicking the icon displays a menu to choose
the paste type, which will change the formatting of the text you just
pasted. With this, you're down to these actions: copy to the clipboard,
switch to Word, paste (Ctrl+V), click the Paste Option button, and either
click or press the T key for the underlined letter to select Keep Text Only.
--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP FAQ:
http://word.mvps.org
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all may benefit.
MyHandsy wrote:
I am (somewhat) sure someone within Microsoft is concerned about the
usability of Office. In particular, I am referring to the Word
component. As it turns out, Word is quite bad at making specially
formatted items look normal, and it is almost never the case that I
even wanted it to try.
So, why do you people think it's OK to bury the "past special"
option? In order to paste something as simply text, I have to get it
into the clipboard and then go back to word (keystroke) select the
past menu (mouse movement and click) select paste special (mouse
movement and click) select "unformatted text" (mouse movement and
click) then click "ok" (mouse movement and click). Not acceptable. I
am surprised you haven't been sued for causing CTDs for this feature
alone. Four mouse movements, four clicks, and a keystroke is very bad
for something that is routinely used.
On the bright side, it is far faster for me to open notepad (mouse
movement and click), paste (keystroke) select all (keystroke) and
copy (keystroke), and go back to Word and paste (keystroke). One
mouse movement and four (consecutive) keystrokes... hundreds of
dollars for the office suite and I have to rely on notepad to launder
my clipboard items?
Whatever data you've collected suggesting that it's better to make it
difficult to paste just the text is just wrong. There is absolutely
no excuse for a "paste as plain text" option to be missing from the
context menu in Word. If there is a religious war going on inside
Microsoft preventing this from happening, please fire a lot of people.
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