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Macros, tips, and templates for Corel® WordPerfect® for Windows®
© Copyright 1996-2023 by Barry MacDonnell. All Rights Reserved.

Using "Other Codes" in WordPerfect
(Format > Line > Other Codes)

Related pages -

Hyphens, hard hyphens [a.k.a. "hyphen characters"], soft hyphens, and hyphenation soft returns . . . What they are and how they work

Indent paragraphs with dot leaders

When you use Format, Line, Other Codes you should see this dialog:

[Some of the above format codes can be inserted with existing shortcuts or assigned to a <shortcut key>.]

• Hard space [HSpace]. Hard spaces, like hard hyphens [a.k.a, "hyphen characters"], are useful in several circumstances, to "glue" words, numbers or dates together to prevent them from splitting to the next line by word wrap. The default shortcut key to insert a hard space is <Ctrl+Space>.
  
  
  • [See also HSPACER, a macro to convert regular spaces in a selection of text to hard spaces. See also "Pasting as unformatted text": WordPerfect 11 and later versions converts hard spaces to regular spaces when you paste this way, but you can use a macro to avoid this.]
    
    
• Hard tabs and Hard tabs with dot leaders. Hard tabs do not change when you change regular tab settings. Use a hard tab when you need to insert a tab without changing the tab type or affecting the tabs for the rest of the document.
  
  
  • For example, you can add a hard tab to one line in a paragraph and not change the tabs set for the other lines. You can also insert a hard tab with a dot leader. [For more on indenting paragraphs with dot leaders see here.]
    
    
  • You can use <Ctrl+Shift+Tab> or <Shift+Tab> to enter a hard back tab (a.k.a., "margin release") to outdent the first line of a paragraph.
     
    
  • Tips
    
    ▸ You can also add a button to a toolbar or property bar for a hard back tab. It's under the Format drop list in the Toolbar Editor (named "Back Tab"; its icon is an arrow pointing leftward toward a vertical bar or margin). To add it to a toolbar or property bar see here.
    
    ▸ See also Tab settings in WordPerfect.
    
    
• End centering/alignment [End Cntr/Align]. This code is often used with line centering (Format > Line > Center), right tabs, or decimal tabs. It doesn't turn off justification, it simply stops previous text alignment when you insert it in a line of text, up to the next alignment code or up to a return to ordinary text.
  
  
  • For example, if you want to add text to the end of the centered line without also pushing the other text leftward, you would type some text, insert a line-center code ([Hd Center on Marg]) with <Shift+F7>, then insert the End centering/alignment code from the dialog (see above), then type the new (non-centered) text.
    
    
  • Another example: If you want to line up numbers or words in a tabbed list with a right tab, but you want to add an asterisk (*) to the end of a number/word (which would normally throw the items out of alignment), just insert the End centering/alignment code [End Cntr/Align] after the number/word and immediately type the astersisk or other material. [Thanks to Jycast, Robin, and Noal Mellot at WordPerfect Universe for this tip.]
    
    
• Hyphens. See "Hyphens, hard hyphens [a.k.a., "hyphen characters"], soft hyphens, and hyphenation soft returns . . . What they are and how they work" here.
  
  
• Cancel hyphenation of word. This codes wraps words that span the hyphenation zone to the next line.
  
  
• Thousands separator. You can change the character used to separate hundreds from thousands.