Move or copy text and graphics - Help and How-to

Warning: You are viewing this page with an unsupported Web browser. This Web site works best with Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 or later, Firefox 1.5, or Netscape Navigator 8.0 or later. Learn more about supported browsers.

Email this link

Printer-Friendly Version Bookmark and Share

Move or copy text and graphics

Applies to: Microsoft Office Word 2003

Do any of the following:

Show Move or copy a single item

Select the item you want to move or copy.
Do one of the following:
- To move the item, click Cut on the Standard toolbar (toolbar: A bar with buttons and options that you use to carry out commands. To display a toolbar, click Customize on the Tools menu, and then click the Toolbars tab.).
- To copy the item, click Copy on the Standard toolbar.
If you want to move or copy the item to another document, switch to the document.
Click where you want the item to appear.
Click Paste on the Standard toolbar.
To determine the format of the items that are pasted, click an option on the Paste Options button that appears just below your pasted selection.

Show Copy and paste multiple items

Show Copy multiple items

Make sure that the Microsoft Office Clipboard is displayed in the task pane (task pane: A window within an Office application that provides commonly used commands. Its location and small size allow you to use these commands while still working on your files.) of any open Office program or the Collect Without Showing Office Clipboard option is turned on.
- If you want to display the Office Clipboard in the active program, click Office Clipboard on the Edit menu.
- If you want to check the Collect Without Showing Office Clipboard option, display the Office Clipboard, click Options, and then make sure the Collect Without Showing Office Clipboard option is checked.
Select the first item you want to copy.
On the Standard toolbar (toolbar: A bar with buttons and options that you use to carry out commands. To display a toolbar, click Customize on the Tools menu, and then click the Toolbars tab.), click Copy .
Continue copying items from documents in any Office program until you have collected all of the items you want (up to 24).

Show Tip

To copy multiple items that aren't next to each other, you can select one item, hold down CTRL, and then select the next item. Then, you can copy and paste them as you would any item.

Note In some cases such as Unicode (Unicode: A character encoding standard developed by the Unicode Consortium. By using more than one byte to represent each character, Unicode enables almost all of the written languages in the world to be represented by using a single character set.) text, the image displayed in the gallery will look slightly altered. This is because text is always displayed in the gallery using the Tahoma font. However, the correct formatting and font information is restored when the item is pasted from the gallery.

Show Paste collected items

If the Microsoft Office Clipboard is not displayed in the task pane (task pane: A window within an Office application that provides commonly used commands. Its location and small size allow you to use these commands while still working on your files.), click Office Clipboard on the Edit menu.
Note If the Office Clipboard is not available, you are in a program or view that doesn't support showing or pasting multiple items from the Office Clipboard.
Click where you want the items to be pasted. You can paste collected items into any Microsoft Office program.
Do one of the following:
- To paste items one at a time, on the Office Clipboard, click each item you want to paste.
- To paste all the items you copied, click Paste All on the Clipboard task pane.

Show Copy a table

In print layout view (print layout view: A view of a document or other object as it will appear when you print it. For example, items such as headers, footnotes, columns, and text boxes appear in their actual positions.), rest the pointer on the upper-left corner of the table until the table move handle appears.
Press CTRL, and drag the table to a new location.

Note You can also copy a table by selecting it and then copying and pasting.

Show Drag information between programs

You can move or copy information, or you can create a linked object (linked object: An object that is created in a source file and inserted into a destination file, while maintaining a connection between the two files. The linked object in the destination file can be updated when the source file is updated.), a shortcut (shortcut: An icon that points to a program or file that is stored in another location.), or a hyperlink (hyperlink: Colored and underlined text or a graphic that you click to go to a file, a location in a file, a Web page on the World Wide Web, or a Web page on an intranet. Hyperlinks can also go to newsgroups and to Gopher, Telnet, and FTP sites.) between documents in different programs by using drag-and-drop editing. Both programs must support OLE (OLE: A program-integration technology that you can use to share information between programs. All Office programs support OLE, so you can share information through linked and embedded objects.).

Arrange the program windows so that both the source file (source file: The file that contains information that was used to create a linked or embedded object. When you update the information in the source file, you can also update the linked object in the destination file.) and the destination file (destination file: The file that a linked or embedded object is inserted into. The source file contains the information that is used to create the object. When you change information in a destination file, the information is not updated in the source file.) are open and visible. You must be able to see the information you want to drag as well as the location where you want to drop it.
Select the information, and then use the right mouse button to drag the selection to the new location in the other program.
On the shortcut menu, click the command you want.

Show Move or copy linked text boxes

You can copy or move a story (story: Text that's contained within a single text box or a chain of linked text boxes.) to another document or to another location in the same document. You must include all the linked text boxes in a story.

Switch to print layout view (print layout view: A view of a document or other object as it will appear when you print it. For example, items such as headers, footnotes, columns, and text boxes appear in their actual positions.).
Select the first text box in a story. To do this, move the pointer over the border of the text box until the pointer becomes a four-headed arrow, and then click the border.
Hold down SHIFT and select each additional text box you want to copy or move.
On the Standard toolbar (toolbar: A bar with buttons and options that you use to carry out commands. To display a toolbar, click Customize on the Tools menu, and then click the Toolbars tab.), click Copy or Cut .
Click where you want to copy or move the text boxes.
On the Standard toolbar, click Paste .

Note To copy or move some text from a story without copying the text box, select the text you want, and then copy or cut it. Do not select the text box.