Blog — Affinity Consulting

MS Word Tip of the Month for January 2016 - Fix Track Changes Settings

Written by Barron Henley | Jan 2, 2016 3:28:20 PM

One of the best and most used features in Word, particularly for lawyers, is Track Changes. Although the recent versions of Word improved the default settings for this feature, there remains room for improvement.

Change the Markup

By default, Word shows you Simple Markup which means that if you delete text, it literally disappears and a little red, vertical line appears in the left margin adjacent to the line where something was deleted. Of course, I not only want to know that something was deleted, but what was deleted. Therefore, switch from Simple Markup to All Markup (see below).

Track Changes Options

In order to get to this dialog, click Review ribbon>Tracking launcher.

Clear Pictures By Comments (unnecessary and clutters up the comment screen).

Balloons are best used for Comments and Formatting only: not Revisions which is the default setting.