Creating Filler Text

If you are looking for a quick way to put meaningless tripe in your document, then Word is only too happy to oblige. Why would you need meaningless tripe? Perhaps to do some testing, fill some space., or to see how text looks in a given page format Regardless, Word provides a quick way to do this. Try the following:

1. Position the cursor at the beginning of a paragraph.
2. Type =rand() and press Enter. (It doesn't really matter if you use lowercase, uppercase, or mixed case.)

Word replaces this text with 3 paragraphs of 3 sentences each. The sentences consist of helpful hints on how to change the appearance of your document. You can vary the number of sentences per paragraph, as well as the number of paragraphs, by using the format =rand(p,s) in step 2. In this format, p is replaced with the number of paragraphs you want and s is replaced with the number of sentences per paragraph. Thus, if you wanted 9 paragraphs of 7 sentences each, you could use =rand(9,7) in step 2. You can leave out the sentence count parameter, if desired, and Word will resort, again, to 3 sentences per paragraph.

If creating this type of meaningless text doesn't work on your system, check the following:

1. Click the Office button and then click Word Options. Word displays the Word Options dialog box.
2. At the left side of the dialog box click Proofing.
3. Click the AutoCorrect Options button. Word displays the AutoCorrect tab of the AutoCorrect dialog box. (Click here to see a related figure.)
4. Make sure the Replace Text As You Type check box is selected.
5. Click OK to close the AutoCorrect dialog box.
6. Click OK to close the Word Options dialog box.

If you are a long-time user of Word, you may remember that in previous versions using =rand() returned sentences about "the quick brown fox." If you are sentimentally attached to that old brown fox, you can instead use the command =rand.old() and Word uses the old sentences as filler. The parameters that can be used with the command are the same.

It is interesting to note that if you look through AutoCorrect replacement text entries in the AutoCorrect dialog box, you will find nothing there about this feature. It seems, instead, to be built into Word "behind the scenes."