Put titles, dates, and references in every page margin

A printed page that has become separated from its document is close to useless if nothing on it says what it is. Running headers and footers solve that, and they take about two minutes to apply to a whole document.

What belongs in the margin

The header and footer tool supports fixed text alongside variables that resolve as they are applied. The useful combinations depend on where the document is going.

Internal working documents benefit most from traceability:

• the document title, so a loose page is identifiable
• the filename, so the source can be found again on a shared drive
• a version or revision marker
• the date the version was produced
• page number and total, so a missing page is noticed

Documents going outside the organisation usually want less. A title, a date, and a page number are plenty. An internal file path in the footer of a client deliverable tells the client about your folder structure, your naming conventions, and sometimes your staff names.

Regulated or classified material often has a mandatory line — a classification marking, a case number, a matter reference, a disclosure identifier. These typically must appear on every page, which is precisely what a running footer is for.

Variables are resolved once

This is the detail that surprises people. A variable such as the page number, the total page count, the date, or the filename is evaluated at the moment you apply the header, and the resulting characters are written into the page.

They are not live fields. Consequences:

• The date shown is the date you applied it, not the date the document is opened or printed. That is usually what you want for a version marker and definitely not what you want if you expected "today".
• Page numbers do not update if the page order changes later.
• The filename stamped is the name at application time. Renaming the file afterwards leaves the old name printed inside it.

So apply headers and footers last, once the document structure is settled. If you later need to restructure, remove and reapply rather than assuming anything updated itself.

Placement and legibility

The same margin discipline applies as for pagination:

• Keep at least 12 millimetres from the page edge. Printers clip, binding eats margin, and hole punches land in exactly the wrong place.
• Use 8 to 10 point type in grey or black. Furniture should be readable when looked for and invisible when reading the content.
• Left-align long text such as titles and file paths; centre short text such as a classification word; right-align page numbers if they share a line.
• Split content across positions rather than crowding one: title on the left, page number on the right, classification centred.

Then check the pages most likely to conflict. A footer that sits comfortably on body pages will collide with a full-width table on page 9 or an edge-to-edge chart on page 14. Scroll the exported file rather than checking only the first page.

Ranges and section-specific text

Applying the same footer to every page is the common case, but not the only one. A cover page usually should not carry the running header — the title is already the largest thing on it. Annexes often want their own reference. Applying to a page range rather than the whole document handles both, and it is cleaner than applying everywhere and then patching.

Choosing between the three marking tools

They overlap enough to cause hesitation, so the distinction is worth stating:

Need	Tool
Just sequential numbers	Page numbering
Text and variables in the margin	Headers and footers
A status mark across the page body	Watermarking

Use pagination when numbers are all you need, as covered in the page numbering guide. Use headers and footers when the margin should carry information. Use a watermark when the mark should cross the content itself, which the watermarking guide explains in more detail.

Applying two of them in one document is entirely normal — a DRAFT watermark across the page and a footer carrying the title, date, and page number is a sensible combination for a document in review. Just apply them in one session, check the result once, and keep an unmarked original.