Free e-book: Wildcard Cookbook for Word
Are you getting the most you can from Microsoft Word? Wildcard search is one of the most powerful features in Word. You can use it to quickly find errors and make changes throughout a document in a matter of seconds. However, wildcards can be complicated. Even advanced users can struggle to keep track of wildcard patterns and their meaning.
The Wildcard Cookbook by Jack Lyon makes it all easier. It carefully explains what wildcards are and how to use them. Packed with detailed screenshots and instruction, it teaches you how to get the most from wildcard search and gives you the confidence to use wildcards in your work. And if coming up with wildcard patterns yourself sounds like hard work, it includes real-world examples that you can simply copy and paste.
The book usually sells for upwards of $12. However, you can get a PDF version absolutely free at the bottom of this page!
Okay, so this isn’t really a cookbook. Well, it’s kind of a cookbook, because it will help you search a Word document with a combination of wildcards and other codes that will give you delicious results. Word’s advanced search features are extremely powerful, but they’re also virtually undocumented, and most explanations of their use have been limited to a simple table of various wildcards. Jack Lyon wrote and published a series of articles to remedy that situation, then packaged the articles as a downloadable paper called “Advanced Find and Replace in Microsoft Word.” This book incorporates his previously written material, updates and reorganizes that material, and adds a wealth of new material, all of which are extremely useful. Although he writes and sells Microsoft Word macros for a living, the tools he depends on most are the advanced features of Word’s find and replace. Learning to use these tools takes time and effort, but the payoff is huge.
Enhance PerfectIt’s Checks with Wildcards
To get even more from wildcard search, you can build rules into PerfectIt so that your searches run every time you use it. PerfectIt will display the results of the wildcard search, and you can click on each one to decide whether to make the change. You can store every search so you’ll never need to remember a wildcard pattern again!
This video tutorial explains how to add wildcard searches to PerfectIt:
About the Author
Jack Lyon is a book editor who got tired of working the hard way and started creating programs to automate editing tasks in Microsoft Word. He's been working in publishing since 1978 and editing on the computer since 1985. He's the founder of The Editorium and Waking Lion Press.
Jack's other books include the Macro Cookbook for Microsoft Word. It's an essential guide to automating Word, and it will teach you how to work faster without any knowledge of programming required. Jack also co-edited the Business of Editing. This collection of essays by Richard Adin discusses the roles, tools, processes, profits, career, and future of freelance editing, providing advice for anyone who makes a living working with words.