Strange symbols on my microsoft Word...how to get rid of

Question

Hi. I am at work.. and I cut and pasted some text from a document into a new Word document. Suddenly the paragraph sign has popped on, and there are dots in between each word typed. These were never there before, and now they show up on every single new document I open. I can't seem to get them off. I have restarted the computer and it did not help. Can anyone tell me why they may be there...and how to GET RID OF THEM? Thank you!!!!

Answer 1

First, don’t worry.  None of the characters print.  

The dots certainly are a nuisance, but those strange ¶ symbols are really your friends. They show exactly where each paragraph ends. Since all paragraph formatting (tabs, indents, margins, line spacing, before and after paragraph spacing, ...) is attached to them, accidentally deleting one can cause mysterious reformatting problems. I've found it's nice to know where they are.

Now, the other characters that may also appear aren't as useful and can be safely turned off. Here's how (with Word XP (2002) and the adjacent versions):

1. Click the Tools->Options menu item.

2. Click the View tab.

3. Under Formatting Marks, select ONLY Paragraph Marks and deselect all others.

4. Click OK.

That's it.

Answer 2

there's an icon on your toolbar that looks like the paragraph symbol.  Just click it and you'll turn off the formatting symbols.  Click it again to turn back on.  

it's not a "problem", it's a "feature".  Sometimes you need to see exactly where word is putting it's formatting controls.  That icon allows you to turn the controls on/off.  

Answer 3

When you "cut & paste" from one Word doc to another, the pasted text will come with its predecessor format.

To avoid that, go to the source text, use the usual copy procedure, but BEFORE pasting it to the destination document, open NOTEPAD (Start / Run / notepad.exe), and paste there.

This procedure will remove the old format and you will have only text.

Now, select the text from the notepad window, copy and got to the destination document, and now you can paste the "clean" text.

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