2004 Word, Entourage, Excel "Help" text selections: how copy toNotes?

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

How does one highlight and then copy text from Help components of Office
2004's Word, Excel and Entourage?

"Select all" and "copy" are grayed out and command-c and command-a do not
work with "Help" text in any of the Office 2004 components.

If there were some way to copy and paste these selections into Entourage
Notes, one could do boolean searches for multiple criteria within "Help"
notes.

This also would allow one to add his or her notations to the "Help"
passages copied into Notes. It would also make it possible to put the
user's synonyms or terms in subject lines for easy Find operations.

Am I missing something here?

Respectfully, Norm

(The original of this post was "lost" and did not appear on the Microsoft
News Server, although it appeared at the newsgroup's Google site.}

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

How does one highlight and then copy text from Help components of Office
2004's Word, Excel and Entourage?

"Select all" and "copy" are grayed out and command-c and command-a do not
work with "Help" text in any of the Office 2004 components.

If there were some way to copy and paste these selections into Entourage
Notes, one could do boolean searches for multiple criteria within "Help"
notes.

This also would allow one to add his or her notations to the "Help"
passages copied into Notes. It would also make it possible to put the
user's synonyms or terms in subject lines for easy Find operations.

Am I missing something here?

-----------------------------------------------
SIMPLE WORKAROUND!

Jim Gordon's response to my other question on magnifying small-size Office
Help text also serves as the jumping off point for a workaround to copying
text from Office's "Help" to Entourage Notes.

In his answer on the other topic, Jim said:

". . . print the help topics as PDF files and open them in Acrobat Reader
or Preview and use the zoom feature in those
applications."

Here's the workaround that sprang from Jim's idea:

1. When on the Help topic one wishes to excerpt in Entourage Notes, hide or
send to the dock all other open windows but the open Help page.

2. Click on Save As and then select PDF document.

3. Open with Apple Preview (it launches faster than Adobe Reader).

4. Highlight all or some of the text, copy that selection, and paste it into
an Entourage Note.

5. Include in subject lines a couple keywords that will make it easy to
find in an Entourage search for either one or more criteria.

And I just copied this 5-step workaround into an Entourage Note but wished
to share it with others following this thread.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[JE McGimpsey]

How does one highlight and then copy text from Help components of Office
2004's Word, Excel and Entourage?

"Select all" and "copy" are grayed out and command-c and command-a do not
work with "Help" text in any of the Office 2004 components.

Copying Help works for me using the mouse to select the text and CMD-c
to copy it...

Occasionally, there seems to be a focus problem where CMD-c no longer
works. Closing and opening the app cures the problem.

For instance, here's a paste of part of the Help page for Word Help's
"Field codes: Bookmark and Ref fields" topic:


=====================

Field codes: Bookmark and Ref fields
{ [REF] Bookmark [Switches ] }
Inserts the text or graphics represented by the specified bookmark. The
bookmark must be defined in the active document. To insert bookmarked
text or graphics from another document, use the INCLUDEPICTURE or
INCLUDETEXT field. The Cross-reference command (Insert menu) inserts REF
fields to create cross-references.
The BOOKMARK field is an abbreviated form of the REF field and isn't
available in the Field dialog box (Insert menu). If a bookmark name (for
example, "Title") matches a Word field name (TITLE), you must use the
REF field. The field { REF Title } inserts the text represented by the
"Title" bookmark, whereas the field { Title } inserts the contents of
the Title box on the Summary tab in the Properties dialog box (File
menu). In most cases, you can use the bookmark name instead of the REF
field.
Note When you insert text copied from another location in the same
document, the Paste Special command (Edit menu) inserts a REF field with
the bookmark INTER_LINKn, where n is incremented automatically. You
should not edit an INTER_LINKn bookmark in a REF field. Also note that
REF fields with INTER_LINKn bookmarks in a data merge main document can
cause errors during merging.

=======================

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

Copying Help works for me using the mouse to select the text and CMD-c
to copy it...

Occasionally, there seems to be a focus problem where CMD-c no longer
works. Closing and opening the app cures the problem.

Aha! It always failed for me when I highlighted with the mouse and used
command-c in Entourage's Help and in Word's Help. I just tested and
command-c failed to copy in both programs. Then I quit out of each and
re-launched. Voila! It copied. And then, without re-launching, command-c
worked in Excel without quitting.

Jim, could the failure to work without quitting and re-launching of Word or
Entourage a bug or is what you shared in this thread a workaround to a void
in Office's programming? Either way, I was wondering whether it has been
reported to Microsoft?

Thanks very much for your responsiveness and sharing of ideas, Jim.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[Norman R. Nager, Ph.D.]

I wish to apologize to J.E. McGimpsey for accidentally addressing him as
"Jim" twice in the same message. The moment I pressed the "send" button I
realized I had erred. It's no excuse that I had just sent a couple notes
responding to Jim Gordon. I think I'll just fall back on saying that I'm
sorry. Norm
Corrected version follows:

Copying Help works for me using the mouse to select the text and CMD-c
to copy it...

Occasionally, there seems to be a focus problem where CMD-c no longer
works. Closing and opening the app cures the problem.

Aha! It always failed for me when I highlighted with the mouse and used
command-c in Entourage's Help and in Word's Help. I just tested and
command-c failed to copy in both programs. Then I quit out of each and
re-launched. Voila! It copied. And then, without re-launching, command-c
worked in Excel without quitting.

J.E., could the failure to work without quitting and re-launching of Word or
Entourage a bug or is what you shared in this thread a workaround to a void
in Office's programming? Either way, I was wondering whether it has been
reported to Microsoft?

Thanks very much for your responsiveness and sharing of ideas, J.E.

Respectfully, Norm

 

[JE McGimpsey]

I wish to apologize to J.E. McGimpsey for accidentally addressing him as
"Jim" twice in the same message. The moment I pressed the "send" button I
realized I had erred.

Don't apologize. By using my initials, I deserve whatever
misidentification I get. One of the regular posters in m.p.excel* groups
has referred to me as Jim for nearly a year. And of course, confounding
me and Jim Gordon is far more flattering to me than to Jim...

could the failure to work without quitting and re-launching of Word or
Entourage a bug or is what you shared in this thread a workaround to a void
in Office's programming? Either way, I was wondering whether it has been
reported to Microsoft?

AFAIC, it's a bug. I thought that I had reported it earlier as a bug,
but I can't find the report, so I'll resubmit it. I'd also encourage you
to submit Help/Feedback...