Setting the A4 page size in OneNote

Let's take a break from testing Equation support in OneNote 2010 to let me respond to everyone with a tip that is bubbling up.

I can't really understand why, but over the past two weeks I have received a handful of emails about changing the page size in OneNote and had at least one face to face conversation about the same thing. Then I saw this question on the discussion group and figured I would broadcast the solution more widely. The odd bit about this is that all but one request wanted A4 page sizing.

In general, though, what some users want is to set a page size (of paper) to be the page OneNote shows in the UI. I can understand this pretty well. The default page size for OneNote is infinite in any direction. This lets the page "keep growing" so you can add information to it without running out of room. This is handy when you are quickly taking notes and just need more space automatically so you can keep taking notes. It doesn't help me when I am trying to visualize what my jumble of notes, ink, images and such will look like if printed.

To change the size, though, can be done very easily. A scenario for this is to change to size of paper you will use for printing to get a feel for how the page will look when printed. The specific questions I have received have centered on the A4 paper size for what that's worth.

To change the size of the current page, click File | Page Setup (in OneNote 2007) and the Page Setup task pane will open. "Task Pane" is the lingo we use for the column that gets added to let you change these settings. At the top of the pane you can change the size to A4, like this:

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I circled a link at the bottom of the pane which may be handy. If you change the page size and want to use the current page to be the default, you can click this link, give the template a name and set it to be the default template to use for new pages in this section. If you do this on a blank page, you will get a new, blank, A4 sized page each time you create a new page in this seciton.

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This all leads to an interesting test case. Suppose you have text that is too large for the new page size, or you keep adding text and going outside the page boundary. Does OneNote block you from adding more text? That would seem counter to the goal OneNote has of easily letting you take notes. Keeping that goal in mind, it would seem that OneNote should NOT block you from adding notes "outside the page boundary," and indeed that is the behavior. Here's what it looks like on my machine:

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The white part is the page, and the gray is the area that is not part of the A4 page. Play around with it - make a page in Unfiled Notes and change the page size around to verify the behavior yourself.

And now you should be able to make a reasonable guess about pasting an 8x10 image on an Index Card size page. Go ahead and test this scenario and verify your assumption!

The last question I am puzzling over is why so many comments about the A4 page size just got came up...

Questions, comments, concerns and criticisms always welcome,

John