Find

The “Find” option allows us to navigate through our document, by searching for a word or phrase.
The “Find” button is found under the tab “Start” in the ribbon.
When we click this button it opens the dialog “Find and Replace” in which the tab “Find” is selected.

In the box “Find what:” type a word or phrase which you want to search.
Once you have typed the text that you want to search, you have several options.
A first option is the button “Find Next”.
When we click on it, Word will start searching at that point where the cursor is in our document.
Again clicking on the button “Find Next”, follows the similar word search.
You can keep clicking until you have found the word.
When Word reaches the end of your document, it will inform you accordingly.

A second option is “Find in”.
When we click on it, it unfolds a menu with several options.
When you choose “Main Document”, Word will show you the number of words found in the dialog.

Once you’ve found what you are searching, click the “Close” button.

Search options

Clicking on the button “More” in the dialog “Find and Replace”, gives us more options that can help in our search.
Above left we have the box “Search:”, which we have the ability to search downward or upward.
Both are depending on the location of the cursor at that moment in the document.
Or a third option “All”, which searches through your entire document.

When you check the box for the text “Match Case”, it will only find the words that are identical to the word with that particaular case.
When you check the box for the text “Find Whole Words only”, it will only search for the complete word and not a part of it.
When the box for the text “Use wildcards” box is checked, Word allows us to use wildcards in our search. More about wildcards in the next lesson.
The text box for the “Sounds like” is applicable only when you work with English texts.
Ditto for the box “Find all word forms”.
The box for the text “Match Prefix” will find all words that begin with the same letter that you have typed.
Ditto for the next box, but for the end character.

The next two buttons “Ignore Punctuation characters” and “Ignore Space Characters” do exactly what they say, they ignore punctuation and spaces.

Find Format

The “Find” option allows us not only to search for text, but also to a certain style of a text.
For example, if you have a specific paragraph in your text that is centered, you can find this by clicking the button “Format” and select “Paragraph”.

In the dialog that appears, choose in the “Alignment” for “Center”, and click OK.
And click “Find Next” in the next dialog.
And this is done for just about any formatting in your document. Depending on which choice you make in the drop-down menu “Format”, there will be a different dialog box appear.
But I do think that it is all quite clear.

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