This is the second in a short series on tracked changes. You can also read about why I don’t believe every change should be tracked, how to set about working on a file where you’re the one to accept or reject changes and how to handle comments in Word.
Editors know that many clients aren’t very familiar with handling files that have the changes tracked, and that those clients can find it alarming when they don’t know which buttons to use to show, or not show, the tracking.
If you, as an author, have your typescript come back full of tracked changes, are you comfortable with how to display things, or accept a whole lot in one go?
There’s no reason why every client should be a Word wiz, so here’s a very short, very incomplete guide, based on Word 365 on a PC. Other versions of Word, including on a Mac, will look a bit different. Google, or another browser, is there if you need help with the version you’re working with.
Finding tracked changes on the ribbon
First, get yourself to the Review tab on the ribbon (the menu of tabs across the top of the screen). The fifth block along it is called Tracking and it looks like this:
The markup viewing options
Click on the little down arrow next to where it says ‘Simple Markup’ and you’ll see four options – simple, all, none or original. ‘Markup’ is simply the term for text that has tracked edits and/or comments bubbles in it.
If you pick Simple Markup, the changes won’t be seen in the body of the text but there’ll be a red line down the left-hand margin showing you on which lines of text changes have been made. Any comments the editor has left for you with queries or explanations will still be visible.
If you pick All Markup, then the floodgates open and you may end up with something that is really difficult to read.
The No Markup option shows you the text after the changes, but the markup for it doesn’t show.
And the Original will take you to the original text with no edits made.
Why not try opening up a file that you know has edits in it – by a co-author or by an editor, and try these different options so you can see how it looks? Flick between one option and another to get a good feel of how easy it is to make tracked changes appear and disappear – if they do either unexpectedly, check what’s displayed for this button and you’ll probably find your answer immediately – just change the view to what you need.
Showing selected markup
Next, click on the down arrow next to Show Markup and see what’s there.
You can see that you’re being offered options as to what is shown – and if you click on the arrows next to Balloons (which means the comments) and Specific People, you can see you can refine it further. If you’re faced with a heavily edited and tracked file, this may ease your burden somewhat.
A little word of warning: if you’ve had feedback on your text from several people, just look through the file first to see if you’ve got several opinions on the same bits of text. If you decide to go through all of A’s edits first, all B’s edits to A’s edits will get garbled, so do approach with care! You may want to stick with All Reviewers, at least initially.
Other tracking tools
The other tools in the Tracking block are simply covered – open them up and have a look, but the big Track Changes button on the left in Figure 1 toggles the actual tracking on and off, just for you or for everyone, which is not the same as seeing changes already present in the file, and the smaller Reviewing Pane allows you to show the pane vertically or horizontally (personally, I find that pane a pain and don’t use it, but we all like to see things arranged differently, so at least check it out and make up your own mind).
Turning tracking on with this button means that every keystroke from now on will be tracked; likewise, turning it off stops every new keystroke from being tracked. It doesn’t affect changes that have already been tracked. To turn those off and on, go back to Figure 2 and the Show Markup options.
You can also lock the tracking if you’re sending the file to someone you don’t quite trust with it!
There’s an easy-to-miss diagonal arrow at the bottom right. If you’re reviewing other people’s changes, you won’t need that. But if you’re writing, it allows you to choose what is tracked and, via the Advanced button, what colours are used and so on. Definitely not for a quick introduction like this one!
Accepting and rejecting changes
Immediately next to the Tracking block, on its right, is one called Changes. This is where you do the accepting or rejecting of changes and it looks like this:
It’s about to get interesting! There are down arrows underneath the Accept and Reject buttons. Those buttons by themselves will accept or reject the change your cursor is sitting in, but those down arrows open up these options (the same for both buttons, except one is to accept and the other to reject):
Use these options with care – you don’t want to accept or reject everything by mistake! But if you do, use the Undo function (normally Control+Z on a PC keyboard, or use the undo button right at the top of the screen – it’s the curved arrow pointing down and to the left).
The Previous and Next buttons, as you might expect, take you to the next change, or back to the previous one.
Turbocharging accepting and rejecting changes
This is where a bit of magic happens.
Suppose you have a file where there are a gazillion changes to spaces, styles and other formatting, and you’re happy to accept them and get them out of your way.
Go back to the original Tracking block of buttons and make sure All Markup is selected. Then click on Show Markup. Make sure only Formatting is ticked:
It’s a bit annoying, but as you click each option on and off to get where you want to be, the little box will keep closing each time. Persevere and keep reopening it!
You’ll now have just the formatting changes showing – as you’ve got All Markup selected before you started, you should see the changes to the words disappear.
If you’re happy you want to accept all of those formatting changes and sort the wheat from the chaff, go next door to the Changes block and click the down arrow on Accept. You can now click on the option ‘Accept all changes shown’.
All the formatting changes are accepted; all the changes to the words are left in place – as long as you remember to go back to the Show Markup button and change that now to show Insertions and Deletions, or you might start to panic that all the changes have been accepted!
In summary
With these few tools you can manipulate what you see, accept and reject changes in bulk and then step through the rest.
No more heart-stopping moments when your file is suddenly full of crossings out and little balloons describing the edit, or when your file suddenly isn’t.
If you let your editor track only substantive changes, you won’t have to work your way through all this, but sometimes an editor will forget and turn tracked changes on to get on with the edit, then come to something that doesn’t need to be tracked, but forget to turn the tracking off, so you are now equipped to handle such a situation.
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