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Somehow, I have a Microsoft Word document with a lot of numbered paragraphs that aren't showing the intended number. This seems to be because the document has a numbering format that's not actually got a number

(this format appears in the "Numbering library" of numbering styles presented when selecting the drop down next to the numbering button in the tool bar)

I didn't (intentionally) define this - the paragraphs were originally numbered with a straightforward "1." style. Something has presumably got corrupted along the way (this is a long lived and much edited document).

If it was a paragraph style, I could just fix the style. Or search-and-replace for paragraphs with that style and replace with another.

But neither option seems (obviously) possible for number formats.

Any ideas? The document has many hundreds of these "numbered but showing no number" paragraphs so I don't want to do them all by hand.

The Archetypal Paul
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  • If numbering has been done with styles, this will be much easier. – harrymc Mar 31 '23 at 15:36
  • See https://superuser.com/questions/1609025/importing-numbered-paragraph-styles-in-word/1609033#1609033 – Charles Kenyon Mar 31 '23 at 15:41
  • @CharlesKenyon, thanks, but I'm not seeing the connection – The Archetypal Paul Mar 31 '23 at 18:57
  • Word has a plethora of ways to number things, most of which do not work well when trying to edit. You need to set the document to use a single multillevel list that is linked to styles. Otherwise, you are beating your head against the wall. You can, if you want save a sample with the problem on OneDrive or DropBox and post a link here. – Charles Kenyon Mar 31 '23 at 23:48
  • Ah, Yes, If I did the doc differently, I agree I wouldn't have this problem. But I do - and that's why I said "The document has many hundreds of these "numbered but showing no number" paragraphs so I don't want to do them all by hand." – The Archetypal Paul Apr 01 '23 at 18:48
  • So save a cleaned up copy of the problem document and post a link. See https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice_word-mso_win10-mso_365hp/why-a-sample-file-is-important-for-troubleshooting/9441ae3c-1e92-41c6-9a1f-5b377b08e5a5?tm=1619027698258 for directions on removing confidential or proprietary content. Otherwise, you will only get people throwing suggestions at you. In any case, you will have to do a lot by hand unless there is some structure that Word can decipher using a macro. If you create the styles, you then can apply them with a keyboard shortcut. – Charles Kenyon Apr 04 '23 at 17:57

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