March 14 2005
Q: Sometimes I get an extra plank page when I print a Word document.  Why is that and how can stop it?
A: Well, when you are typing a letter, memo, document, report, etc, in Word, Word is recording each keystroke.  What I mean is that every time you press the keyboard, Word is entering a character on the page.

Most of the characters are visible-like the letters that consist of the text you type.  Some of the characters are invisible-like when you press the SPACEBAR or when you press the ENTER key.  The invisible character left behind after pressing the ENTER key is the crux of this problem.

The reason a blank page prints when you print that Document in Word is because at the end of that Document there is a collection of invisible ENTER characters-enough to push your Document into printing an extra page.

To eliminate these characters (and the unneeded blank page) all you need to do is:
1. Press and hold the CTRL key and press the END key
-This will take place your cursor at the absolute end of your Document
2. Press the BACKSPACE key until you reach the last text of your Document
3. Save your Document
-You can then verify that you have eliminated the extra page by looking at the lower left hand side of the Window.  You will see a fraction like '1/2' which means your cursor is on page one of two.  If your Document was 4 pages and you successfully deleted the unneeded ENTER characters it should read '1/3'.

If you would like to see the non-printing characters like SPACEBAR, ENTER, etc., look in the Toolbar in the upper right hand side of the Window for a button that has a paragraph symbol and click on it.  Click on it again to turn it off.