Tiling Documents

If you have multiple documents open, you can choose the Arrange All option from the Windows menu and have your documents stacked, one on top of another. What if you want the documents side by side, however? Word has no native feature that allows you to tile documents in this direction.

If you are using Word 2000 or a later version, there is a very easy way to tile your documents side by side. All you need to do is right-click on the Windows taskbar, then choose Tile Windows Vertically. This works, of course, because beginning with Word 2000 (unlike earlier versions), Word uses what is known as a Single Document Interface (SDI). This is just a fancy way of saying that you have only one document per instance of Word, instead of multiple documents.

If you are using Word 97, then the taskbar approach won't work. Instead, you must use a macro to accomplish the same task. The following macro will tile up to five documents in the width available to Word:

Sub SplitIt()
    Dim WinWidth As Long
    Dim WinLeft As Long
    Dim DocCount As Long

    DocCount = Application.Documents.Count
    If DocCount < 6 Then
        WinWidth = Application.UsableWidth / DocCount
        WinLeft = 0
        For Each DocWin In Application.Windows
            DocWin.Activate
            DocWin.WindowState = wdWindowStateNormal
            DocWin.Top = 0
            DocWin.Left = WinLeft
            DocWin.Height = Application.UsableHeight
            DocWin.Width = WinWidth
            WinLeft = WinLeft + WinWidth
        Next DocWin
    End If
End Sub

This VBA macro will also work in Word 2000 or later versions, if you don't want to use the taskbar approach.