8.1 Sections, headers, footers and page numbers

What you'll be able to do

Build a report with a cover page, front matter numbered i, ii, iii, and chapters numbered 1, 2, 3, all correct. It works once you understand the one idea underneath it: the section.

Before you start

Download the long report practice document. Its numbering and headers are wrong in the standard ways, and they are waiting to be fixed.

The work

1. Same either way: get the idea before the clicks. A section is a part of the document with its own page setup: its own headers, footers, numbering, orientation and even margins. A page break, Ctrl+Enter, starts a new page. A section break starts a new set of rules. Every cover page and every roman-numeral requirement is really a section requirement.
2. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: insert them from Layout → Breaks → Section Breaks. Next Page starts the new section on a fresh page, which is almost always the one you want. Continuous changes the rules in the middle of a page, which suits a change of columns. With formatting marks on (Ctrl+Shift+8), a section break shows as a labelled double line, so always work on sections with the marks visible.
3. Same either way: structure the practice report now. Put a Next Page section break after the cover, and another after the contents pages. That gives three sections: cover, front matter and body. It is the skeleton every formal report shares.
4. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: headers and footers belong to a section. Double-click in a page's header area to open it. The header bar names the section you are in, and it shows Link to Previous, the switch behind the classic disaster. While that is on, editing any section's header edits them all. Switch it off — Header & Footer tab → Link to Previous — before you customise a section. Then the cover can have no header while the chapters carry their titles. Different First Page, and Different Odd & Even Pages, on the same tab, refine things inside a section.
5. No documented keyboard shortcut for this — use the menu: page numbers belong to a section too. In the front-matter section's footer, use Insert → Page Number, then Format Page Numbers → Number format i, ii, iii, and Start at i. In the body section's footer, use format 1, 2, 3, and Start at 1. Two sections, two sets of numbering, both correct, which is what this lesson promised. Unlink the footers first, or the change spreads.
6. Same either way: audit with the status bar. Right-click it, either with Shift+F10 when the focus is there or with the mouse, and switch on Section. The bar then always names the section the cursor is in. Walk the document from end to end, reading the section numbers, headers and page numbers. Thirty seconds, and every set of rules is confirmed.

Try it

Fix the practice report completely. Three sections. No header and no number on the cover. Roman numerals on the front matter. Ordinary numbering restarting at 1 for the body. Chapter headers unlinked, so each is its own. Keep the marks on throughout.

Check yourself