Hi, Hope you don't mind a suggestion from an occasional lurker. I had the same problem with Word 2007. When you enter, look on the left side at Change Styles. Click, select Style Set, then select Word 2003. The spacing will now be at a real 1.0. Drives me nuts when they "fix" something that wasn't broken! I'm afraid I don't know how to make this choice permanent, but someone else probably knows how.
Pat

That's a tremendous help. Thank you so much, Pat. Word 2007 takes a lot of struggling to learn. I guess taking a class would be most helpful. I'm "home schooling" myself, and it isn't easy! LOL!

Thanks again.

Thanks from me, too!!! This was such an annoyance, I also had no idea how to deal with this, and was constantly having to click layout and change the spacing. Why'd they have to "fix" this???

I was about to chime in to tell you how I fixed it . . . but I can't remember!

I also fixed the dash. My Word 2007 didn't turn two hyphens into a dash; it left them as hyphens. I do remember how to fix that. :-)

Hold the shift key when you hit the return (enter) key, it will give you single line spacing. Don't know how to make it stay that way though...

Hey, that's a good tip as well, nycefarm. This is such a complicated program to learn with all the tabs on the top. I've managed to conquer most of the issues I've had except that nasty line spacing problem.

So how do you turn two hyphens into a dash, Susan?

Or, you could do what I did when I got my new laptop. I tried Word and Excel and hated it. Got out my 2003 Office software and loaded it on to use. LOL. I don't use them enough anymore to go to all the trouble of learning a new one when the old one does everything I want to do.

A lot of people have probably done that, Pris.

For the line spacing (and yes it's an annoyance, aka a Microsoft "feature") right click on the page, click Paragraph. In the middle toward the right it says "Spacing". Mine defaults to "Multiple" at 1.15 spaces. Just click and select "Single" for a single spacing.

Now if you're like me and occasionally need to fit more on a page, like for a form or something, instead of selecting Single, choose "Exactly" and you can choose the #pts and experiment on how you want it spaced. I find that I like the spacing close but different fonts need different spacing.

Now, you want to avoid this every time you open it up? Save this blank form as a new template. Might as well set up your favorite font, hyphenation characteristics if different, margins and if you use headers/footers get them set, then save it as a new template. You can't save it as "normal.dot" the default template, however, name it normalBU.dot and you have a backup. Then close Word, search for normal.dot and delete it, keeping track of the folder in which it's contained. Your new normalBU.dot should be in the same folder. Then go in and COPY normalBU.dot as normal.dot and whenever you open Word your new template will open.

Try that and see if that helps.
Pressing Ctrl+1 should give you single space, ctrl+2 for double and ctrl+5 for space and a half but if the paragraph settings are off it won't give you what you like.

Wonderful. I've saved all these ways to change spacing so next time I work I won't struggle so much. Cynic, do you teach Word 7??? You really have it all nailed down! Thanks.

LOL, thanks for the compliment but no I don't teach it. Well not anymore. Used to teach computer classes when I had the store. But a lot of people ask for help and I try to do what I can. I use Word quite a bit and upgraded about a year ago to 2007. Frankly I found my old 2000 version was easier in many ways but this is the current stuff and gives more options.

The spacing thing has always bugged me. Took a while to get used to the line adjustment and experimenting. OH, forgot one important suggestion! When you experiment, first SAVE the file, then SAVE AS to a different name. Then you can play with it and if you mess it up, just go back to the original file and you're not messed up. Do this often. You won't regret it. I used to have a lot of trouble with Word locking up on me and of course always after I had done a LOT of work. So I learned then to save, and save often, and to save backups!