Word 2016 page numbering oddity in display mode

kartvelo

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Aug 12, 2003
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Hey there,
I have a 280-page doc with multiple sections. The largest section (main body) has a TOC at the beginning. Clicking on an entry in the TOC takes me to the right page (content-wise), but somewhere between page 67 and page 75 the page numbers on the pages become different than the pages in the TOC and stay that way for the rest of the document. Off by one or two pages, varying throughout. The TOC links still bring me to the right content pages, but the numbers at the bottom of the page are wrong.

The TOC is fully updated. Actually printing the doc, they all seem OK, but it's disconcerting to see the wrong page numbers in display mode every time just before I print another 280-page copy for distribution.

Any idea what's going on in display mode?
 

kartvelo

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Aug 12, 2003
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I have been updating fields manually. Even tried deleting and replacing the TOC entirely.
 

RetractableRoof

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Dec 1, 2003
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I get paranoid when I work with documents that big. When I start feeling/seeing wonky behavior the paranoia grows. I would try something stupid like saving the document with a new name under the oldest file format that you have available that won't cause it to lose any formatting/features (I don't know what else you've got going on in the document besides TOC). Then close Word completely - if you think it's possible you've got some portion of it remaining in memory after closing Word, I'd reboot. (Including if you've got other office stuff running.) At that point open the new version of the document and see what you get. Honestly, in the absence of memory leaks, bugs, etc. none of this type of stuff should do a damn thing. On the other hand, what does it cost you?

The other thing I'd consider (and can't remember the keystroke to do so), is to make the Field Codes visible. Then page around the TOC area, and the area that gets wonky in display, but then prints ok, and see if somehow you've got an artifact laying around that shouldn't matter, but is there.

It's been a while since I wrote macros, and object related stuff in Word documents, and I don't miss it, it can get real wonky fast.