The horizontal ruler is one area in Word where you can quickly set up margins, tab stops, and hanging indents.  You can access this by clicking on the view link and the ruler box.

The horizontal ruler is the bar across the top of your Word document with measurements marked out on it.

The ruler marks off the width of a page and follows the page setup information. For example, a standard letter's ruler will be a total of 8.5 inches. But the ruler measures from the left margin of a document, not the edge. So the scale on the ruler counts both to the left and the right, with the left margin being the start (or zero point) of the scale.

You can always move margins in the document by just sliding them along the ruler.
The sliding markers on the ruler are all for positioning paragraphs of text on a page. To set the indent for more than one paragraph, select all of the text you want to adjust before setting the indents.

• The First Line Indent does just that: position the slider where you want the first line of a paragraph to start (or be indented).
• The Hanging Indent is the triangle on top; it positions the start of the second and all following lines of text.
• The Left Indent is the square underneath the hanging indent; it's used to move the hanging indent and first line indent together, keeping a constant space between them.
• The Right Indent positions the right indent of a paragraph.

You can move indents into the margins of a document.

You can quickly set tabs by clicking the tab selector at the left end of the ruler, choosing the type of tab you want, and then clicking the ruler at the location you want. But which type of tab stop should you use?

• The Left Tab sets the start position of text that will then run to the right.
• The Center Tab sets the position of the middle of the text.
• The Right Tab sets the right end of the text. As you type, the text moves to the left.
• The Decimal Tab aligns text around a decimal point. Independent of the length of the figure, the decimal point will be in the same position.
• The Bar Tab is the odd one out, as it doesn't position text. It inserts a vertical bar at the tab position.

If you want your tab stops at precise positions that you can't get by clicking the ruler, you can use the Tabs dialog box (Format menu).