PowerPoint Pearls: More On Formatting Text
In the course of delivering my PowerPoint workshops, I have noticed a few items that always elicit an “Ohhhhh” from the audience. Here are two related to text formatting.
Notice the bad break that occurs in the first text box. The “2” should not be separated from the rest of the range or from its units. Many people use a hard return (Enter key) to force the line break. PowerPoint sees this as a new concept and increases the space between the lines. The best way to force the line break is to resize the text box. Click to review Resizing Text Boxes.
Another thing you may notice about the first line of text in the screen above is the hanging indent. This style is used to align the text in a bulleted list. If you do not require bullets, the hanging indent is unnecessary.
Here's how to make the hanging indent go away.
- Be sure that the ruler is visible. If not, click View, Ruler.
- Select the textbox by clicking on its text. This will display the indent and tab markers.
- Click on the upper pointed portion of the Left Indent Marker and drag it to align with the First-line Indent Marker.
