Hi all,

I am starting formatting my PhD thesis ( 5 chapters) soon. I am wondering how long I should expect it to take me.
I will using MSword.

I'm sure it partly depends on the person, as in how good they are with word etc
but I am just trying to get a rough idea of how long it will take.

Thank you!

As you say it will depend on person to person. Though I would guess a week or two depending on how much you have already done. Personally, I have used templates extensively for tables, graphs, text, headers etc. I format a few pages and save it as a template and then apply it to the entire document. It can save a lot of time and makes everything consistent without much effort

I found Word to be an absolute pig to use, especially for large engineering documents containing many equations, tables, figures etc. I'd recommend you use LaTeX if you want to save yourself a headache when it comes to formatting. Granted there's a bit of a learning curve to overcome at first but if your patient with it it’s highly rewarding, not only in terms of ease of formatting but also the quality of the final product. Good luck.

My thesis was 7 chapter- formatted in word. It took be about two/three weeks. I did have each chapter formatted before sticking it all together. I found it easier to tackle one type of formatting at a time. For example- making sure all heading were the same styles, then move onto the sizing of graphs etc.

I would say to leave the table of contents etc until last- I done this first and had to edit it multiple times.

OMG, all your replies saying it might take so much time. I'm just a MA graduate. Do you guys think it's worth applying for a Ph.D.?

Definitely it depends upon the changes from person to person. It takes roughly two to three week on the time that you spend on the research and other things. The most time consuming things are like graphs, tables. I would like to say that make some plans regarding the topic and schedule the timing for PhD thesis writings.

UPDATE

So, I formatted in MsWord and I can say it takes about four days. There are just a finite number of tasks and it is pretty manageable. I only had some tables and graphs, which I confess I still have to format properly, so perhaps those with lots of mathical equations or images this advice doesnt hold as well.

It is a good idea to leave an extra day, because it can get tiring and it is easy make an odd error. So if you were able to format it and leave it and come back a day later, you might find that helpful and a more stress-free way to do it.

Youtube has great free tutorials on a lot of aspects. I also purchased a 'how to format your PhD Thesis' course by James Hayton. The course was very helpful, for me, to get started, though as I was formatting consistent with APA style, I had to still go to youtube and find alternative ways of doing some things. It was still very helpful and I would recommend it.

I will say that there are a few formatting things it is good to do before you start writing at all; such as deciding what margins your pages are going to be. Other things like setting you type font/line spacing and paragraph spacing are not essential to do before you start out, but it would be no harm.

All in all, I was very scared about formatting the thesis; really thought I was going fup it up. I can say, it is actually fine. I have never used latex and I know lots of people recommend it, so it must have some benefits, BUT, I fail to understand how learning to use an totally novel software would be worth it. it seems totally unnecessary to me, and like it would be a lot of extra time and stress.