Steve Cooper

I’m writing fiction at the moment. Which of course means I’m wasting time fiddling with formatting in Word.

A neat manuscript requires a word count on the first page. MS Word will give you a neat word count if you try the Insert menu, then Field..., choose NumWords, and hit OK.

It’s fine, as far as it goes, but it’s very precise; it gives you a count that looks a little too autistic; ‘7672 words’. What you’d rather see is an approximation to, say, 100 words. Something more like ‘7700 words’. It’s fiddly, but you can do it. Save this off in a template somewhere and you’ll have automatic, neat wordcounting for ever after.

1. use Insert | Field...
2. Click the ‘Formula’ button

3. Type what follows and hit OK.

   = round ( 666 / 100 , 0) * 100

   You should see ‘700′ displayed as the approximate word count. This is 666 rounded to the nearest hundred. Change 100 to 1000 in the line above to round to the nearest thousand. To get your story’s count…

4. Right-click the number 700 and choose ‘Toggle Field Codes’

5. Select the number 666
6. Hit ctrl-F9. The number now reads { 666 }

7. Delete 666 and type NumWords instead.

   { = round ( { NumWords } / 100 , 0) * 100 }`

8. Right-click the grey field and choose ‘Update Field’

9. Voila! A neat wordcount, rounded to the nearest 100 words, and always up-to-date. The awesome power of a computer, neatly rounded.