8.2 Tables of contents, captions and cross-references

What you'll be able to do

Give a report a contents page, numbered figures and cross-references that keep themselves correct. Each of them is worked out from structure you already built, rather than text you typed.

Before you start

Carry on in the long report practice document, now with proper sections. It also needs proper heading styles from the Word Core module, because everything here runs on them.

The work

1. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: the table of contents is what the styles module was for. Put the cursor on the contents page, go to References → Table of Contents, and pick a built-in one. Word assembles it from your Heading 1, 2 and 3 paragraphs, with titles, levels, page numbers and links. A document without heading styles gets an empty contents page, and that is the moment many people finally believe in styles.
2. Same either way: never edit the contents page's text. It is a field, which means a worked-out result, and edits by hand disappear at the next update. When headings change, update it: click in it and press F9, choosing Entire Table. Pressing Ctrl+A and then F9 updates every field in the document at once.
3. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: now captions. Select a figure or a table and go to References → Insert Caption, then choose the Figure or Table label. Word numbers it, and it renumbers everything when a figure is added in the middle. That is the whole reason captions beat labels typed by hand. For numbering like "Figure 3-2", use the caption dialog's Numbering → Include chapter number, which runs on your Heading 1s.
4. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: now cross-references. Where the text says "see Figure 4", never type the 4. Go to References → Cross-reference, choose Figure and the caption you mean, and choose what to insert, such as the label and number. The reference is a field pointing at the caption, so when figures are reordered the text follows. The same dialog refers to headings, as in "see the section called…", and to page numbers, as in "on page 12".
5. Same either way: here is the habit to build, because fields update when printed or when asked, and not continuously. Before any document leaves you, press Ctrl+A and then F9. Every contents entry, caption number, cross-reference and page number is worked out again. A report sent with "see Figure 7" pointing at the wrong figure was one keystroke away from being right.
6. Same either way: look at the machinery once, so that it never startles you. Press Alt+F9 and every field shows its code inside braces. Press it again to go back to the results. Grey shading when you click, and codes under Alt+F9, are how you recognise worked-out text that you must never edit by hand.

Try it

Give the practice report a real contents page. Caption its three figures and one table with chapter numbering. Replace every typed "see figure…" with a live cross-reference. Then insert a new figure in the middle, press Ctrl+A and F9, and watch the numbers, the references and the contents page all correct themselves.

Check yourself