Assume I have a couple hundred Word documents in a folder (and maybe
subfolders). A few of the documents are quite large (20,000 words or more).

1. How can I create a consolidated index of all these documents. What
I'm wanting is a index that will display information like the following:

Topic Document Page
Port of Seattle Seattle4.doc 14, 21, 29
Port of Seattle Washington5.doc 9, 17
Quebec History Canada.doc 5, 11
Quebec History Quebec.doc 1, 3, 4

If there is a way to create a consolidated index, does it require that
all of the documents contain indices? If so, does anyone have a macro
that will create indices for multiple documents?

2. Can you also tell me the best way to search multiple documents
without opening them all? I know that Windows Explorer will do this but
I'm wondering if there is a better solution? I know that Google Desktop
will search documents, but I was under the impression that it only
indexed the first 10,000 words in a document.

Thank you!!!!

Brian

Hi Brian

BW wrote:
Assume I have a couple hundred Word documents in a folder (and maybe
subfolders). A few of the documents are quite large (20,000 words or
more).

1. How can I create a consolidated index of all these documents. What
I'm wanting is a index that will display information like the following:

Topic Document Page
Port of Seattle Seattle4.doc 14, 21, 29
Port of Seattle Washington5.doc 9, 17
Quebec History Canada.doc 5, 11
Quebec History Quebec.doc 1, 3, 4

If there is a way to create a consolidated index, does it require that
all of the documents contain indices? If so, does anyone have a macro
that will create indices for multiple documents?

Word's INDEX field relies on predefined index entries (XE fields). So,
even in a single document, INDEX will display nothing or rather an error
if you have no XE fields. There are two different ways how you propagate
INDEX fields: You do it manually, or via a concordance file. Alas, the
quality of an unedited index created in the latter way is not well
regarded. This means you will probably have to do a lot of re-editing of
the automatically produced XE fields -- and, in turn, you might start
with the manual approach right away.

Compiling INDEX fields from more than one file is usually done with a
"virtual Master document" (RD fields).

Alas, there is no predefined way of displaying a combined index (with a
middle column as you are discribing it). You either arrange your
documents so that page numbering is in one sequence (and then you can
forget about the indiv. documents in the index), use "Folio by chapter"
on a file basis (but that would need one distinct instance of a numbered
style in each document, and is a bit out-of-date nowadays), or use VBA
to convert an INDEX of the last type into your table of choice.

Make sure you read:

How can I automatically generate an index in Word? (by John McGhie)
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Numbering/CreateIndex.htm

HTH
Robert
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