Macro of the Month – March 2021 – ParenthesesEtcPairDelete

Deletes a pair of punctuation marks (quote marks, parenthesis, etc.)

last updated: 4/1/2024

Thank you to everyone who attended last week’s Intermediate Macro class. Congratulations for diving into some heady topics, like how and when to use FRedit versus MultiSwitch and how to customize macros for your editing process. If you missed the class, a recording is available here.

ParenthesesEtcPairDelete

Do you ever find yourself with a manuscript full of words and phrases unnecessarily surrounded by quotation marks? ParenthesesEtcPairDelete will save you time by automatically deleting both quotation marks at once. It also works with other pairs of punctuation marks like parentheses, brackets, and even commas. I have come to love these speeding editing macros for how they reduce the strain on my hands.

Get a copy of ParenthesesEtcPairDelete here. 

Troubleshooting: A Macro suddenly stops working

Do you sometimes find that a macro has suddenly stopped working? When that happens, it likely needs to be updated. Paul Beverley occasionally modifies macros to make them run faster, to add features, or to fix a problem. For instance, Microsoft made a recent change that caused nearly 10% of the macros to stop working. 
 
If you experience an error, try updating your copy of that macro, even if the version date hasn’t change. Because of the volume of macros that needed to be revised due to the Microsoft modification, the version dates on the macros weren’t updated.
 
The most updated version of all macros can be accessed through the Macro Menu. Click on the name of the macro on the left to get the text of the macro ready to be copied and pasted in Word.

Upcoming Training

Rhonda Bracey is leading a session on macros on April 22 at the 2021 virtual ACES conference. One Command to Rule Them All: Introduction to Word Macros will cover how to record macros, assign keyboard shortcuts, and other foundational information about macros. Information about the conference is available here.
 
If you’ve ever been curious about what PerfectIt can do and how it works, Hilary Cadman offers self-paced online training courses on both PerfectIt Cloud and PerfectIt 4. While PerfectIt is not a macro, macros and PerfectIt can be well paired in your set of editing tools. Information about the PerfectIt training is available here. 


As always, I would love to hear from you. Tell me what your current favorite macro is or a tip or trick you’ve discovered. 
 
Be safe and well,
Jennifer