How to update ALL fields in a document at once--caption numbers in text boxes and the text layer, headers and footers.

Anonymous
2010-03-13T02:21:19+00:00

My title just about says it--all of my  all.  I'm working on a long document; all of my inserted objects (figures and tables) are in text boxes with their captions.  Throughout the editing process some objects have been deleted or moved so now they're completely out of order.

How do I get them all to update at once?  When I select all (Ctrl+A) only the body gets selected.  It is currently ignoring all tables, figures, headers, footers where I have a lot of fields.  I don't mind having to go into the header/footers manually because that at least only has to be done once.  But with my captions, currently I have to select each caption in each text box seperately to update them. 

I appreciate all of your help.

Additionally, I have figured out that I can go to Print Preview and get them to all update so it's getting better...BUT I have two figures on a page (one on the top half and the other on the bottom half) and their figure numbers are out of order. 

Top of Page:  Figure 4-5

Bottom:  Figure 4-4

I've tried updating manually, I've even deleted both captions and re-input them...nothing.  What is going on?

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Jay Freedman 208.3K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2010-03-13T04:51:07+00:00

Going to Print Preview and back is the best way of updating all fields at once.

Do you by chance have the pictures and their captions in text boxes? If so, the caption numbering will be in the order of the locations of the "anchors" of the text boxes, not in order of the positions of the boxes themselves. First go to Office button > Word Options > Display and check the box to show object anchors. Now go to the page with the problem, and click on the edge of the upper text box. Note which paragraph has the anchor symbol next to it. Now click the lower text box. If the anchor for this one is on a paragraph higher on the page than the first one, drag it to a paragraph below the first one. Then go to Print Preview to update the captions, and they should straighten out.

Jay Freedman MS Word MVP

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-03-21T22:09:55+00:00

    That's what I found to be the easiest way to update all the fields at once. Though you don't need to right click on one of the fields needing to be updated once you have selected all. You can right click on any of the selected text to get the "Update Field" option to work for all fields.

    Thanks for posting.

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-03-15T06:50:23+00:00

    Certainely, both F9 and Print Preview are the simplest and easier ways to update the fields in a document.

    Many thanks for the tips.

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  4. Anonymous
    2012-01-13T16:58:05+00:00

    I selected all (Ctrl + A), then right clicked on single field that was highlighted grey (one of many that needed updating), and clicked 'update field'. This updated all of them simultaneously. Job done.

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