Unfortunately, companies use Microsoft Word frequently to write reports. Word has basic support for Tables of Contents, Cross-Referencing, and Captions for Images and Tables, which Word refers to as fields. One issue is that Word does not update the fields automatically without requiring user interaction.

I use an application called Raditeq’s Radimation to control EMC hardware and compile reports. Radimaton has a templating function that assembles multiple Microsoft Word documents into a comprehensive report. The Front cover and introduction document contain the “Table of Contents”, and each section can make use of the Microsoft Word Styles, including Headers, sub-headings, Captions, etc. However, once the multiple documents are assembled, page numbers, the section heading numbers, and captions need to be re-numbered, and the table of contents needs to be updated.

Unfortunately, there does not seem to be an automated way to once Radimation has compiled the report, but it’s fairly simple to do it manually.

Update field-codes manually:

There are two easy ways to manually update all fields; Out of the two, I prefer the second.

• Choose Update all fields from the Template menu, if present
• Select the whole document ( Ctrl + A ) and press F9 (twice).

This won’t update fields in headers or footers, though

• Choose Print Preview from Word’s File menu.

Update Fields in Word Before Printing

This will only work if Update fields is turned on on the Print page of the Tools → Options dialogue box.

This option, found on the Print page of the Options dialogue, forces Word to update all field codes just before a document is printed or the print preview is shown.

It is best to turn this option on unless you’ve a good reason to turn it off. That way, figure numbering and cross-references will be up-to-date when you print. If this option is off, you can update field codes manually.