Automating Word with Ruby: Adding Bookmarks

Someone recently asked a question about using Ruby to add bookmarks to a Microsoft Word document. Here's a brief, but hopefully helpful, explanation...

Word's Document object includes a Bookmarks collection. To get a reference to this collection, call the Bookmarks() method on the Document object:

require 'win32ole'
word = WIN32OLE.connect('Word.Application')
doc = word.ActiveDocument
bookmarks = doc.Bookmarks()

To create a new bookmark, call the Add() method on the Bookmarks collection, passing it (1) a one-word name for the new bookmark, and (2) the range to be bookmarked. The following line of code adds a new bookmark, cleverly named 'Bookmark1', for the currently selected text:

bookmarks.Add('Bookmark1', word.Selection)

The Bookmarks collection includes (among others) a Count() method for getting the number of items in the collection, and an Exists() method for determining if a bookmark with that name already exists. So the following code prints the number of bookmarks, then adds a bookmark if it doesn't already exist, then prints the number of bookmarks again:

puts(doc.Bookmarks.Count)
if not doc.Bookmarks.Exists('Bookmark1')
    doc.Bookmarks.Add('Bookmark1', word.Selection)
end
puts(doc.Bookmarks.Count)

To get a reference to an individual Bookmark, call the Bookmarks() method and pass it the name of the bookmark:

bookmark1 = doc.Bookmarks('Bookmark1')

To delete an individual Bookmark, call its Delete() method:

doc.Bookmarks('Bookmark1').Delete

There you have it. Let me know if you have questions or comments. And, of course, there'll be more on this topic (and many others) in the book I'm currently working on.

Thanks for stopping by!