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This small macro overstrikes every character in a selection of text, similar to the WordPerfect Format>Font>Strikeout function, but with the option of using any character or symbol as the overstrike character. It also can overstrike many blocks of text at once, not just single characters. [See this sample screen shot after using a slash mark on the keyboard as the overstrike character.]

When you play the macro, a small dialog opens to let you choose the overstrike character or symbol (use Ctrl+W to access symbols to insert in the dialog).

Notes

• The macro deletes all underlying characters in the selected block of text and replaces them with a code (i.e., with WordPerfect's Overstrike code (Format>Typesetting>Overstrike)). As noted, it can overstrike many blocks of text at once, not just single characters; however, a whole document might take a few seconds or a minute or two to process (you should see its progress in the WordPerfect status bar.)
• The overstrike code displays as the original character with the overstrike character or symbol superimposed on it. [Sample screen shot.]
• Also, any bookmarks inside the selection are moved outside it. This should let you delete the selection without deleting the bookmark. (Use Reveal Codes to be sure.)
• You can usually undo any changes to your document with Edit>Undo or Ctrl+Z.
• You can also save the changed document under a different name to preserve your original. (Recommended.)
• See also Redactor, which can "block out" text.

Tips

• Slashes ("/"), pipes ("|"), or asterisks ("*") as overstrike characters help reveal the text underneath. (If you really want to obliterate the underlying text in a printout, use Redactor.) Some characters (e.g., slash; pipe) do a better job of maintaining the original length of the selected text when using proportional fonts.
• Also experiment with WordPerfect symbols as overstrike characters, which can be entered in the dialog with <Ctrl+W>.
  • Symbol 3,19 in the Box Drawing set might make a good replacement for an equals sign ("=") since it doesn't seem to leave gaps between each character, but it does stretch the selection of text a bit.
  • Symbol 6,231 in the Math/Scientific set is a double slash symbol ("//") and often does a good job in both striking out the text so it is still readable and maintaining the length of the selected text. [See this sample screen shot after using the double slash mark symbol as the overstrike character.]
• See the redlined comments in the macro's code to (1) change the default overstrike character or symbol; (2) remove the dialog to speed operation; or (3) remove the informational message that appears at the end of processing. You can also add redline or other text attributes to the over-struck stext.