Characters changed in all my documents! Help!

[Michelle]

I recently moved to a new G5 from my old G4. In many of my Word X documents
I have typed the following combination of characters:

-->

However, after the switch, EVERY instance of "-->" has become a
one-character diamond symbol! I assume this is a problem with the
preferences, but I didn't know intuitively which pref I should change to get
my "-->" all back! Do you know?

Thanks for your help!

Michelle

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Michelle,

It sounds like an AutoCorrect issue. Usually --> corrects to a regular
arrow. What I think is happening is that the arrow symbol is not available
for some reason and a diamond is being substituted. Go to Tools menu>
AutoCorrect> AutoCorrect. Type --> in the Replace box. At the top of the
list below you should now see the --> with the arrow (or diamond) at the
right. Select that line and click Delete. Alternatively (if you want to
turn off all AutoCorrection), you can uncheck Replace Text as you Type.

This will stop the action in the future but it won't fix the "corrections"
that have already occurred. To do that, use Word's Find and Replace
function (Edit menu) to replace all diamonds with -->. You'll have to do
this for each document.

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[Michelle]

Thanks for your advice, Beth. What I'd really like to know is what the
"some reason" is when you write, " What I think is happening is that the
arrow symbol is not available" I don't think it's a font problem since the
arrow symbol is, I believe, a Wingdings 3 font symbol and that font is
properly installed in my system.

In addition, when I followed your instructions and typed "-->" in the
replacement box there was no entry for it in the list at all. Yet the
diamond symbol still is substituted for "-->" whenever I type it.

I'd appreciate any further insights you'd have on this!

Michelle

for some reason and a diamond is being substituted.

Hi Michelle,

It sounds like an AutoCorrect issue. Usually --> corrects to a regular
arrow. What I think is happening is that the arrow symbol is not available
for some reason and a diamond is being substituted. Go to Tools menu>
AutoCorrect> AutoCorrect. Type --> in the Replace box. At the top of the
list below you should now see the --> with the arrow (or diamond) at the
right. Select that line and click Delete. Alternatively (if you want to
turn off all AutoCorrection), you can uncheck Replace Text as you Type.

This will stop the action in the future but it won't fix the "corrections"
that have already occurred. To do that, use Word's Find and Replace
function (Edit menu) to replace all diamonds with -->. You'll have to do
this for each document.

------ Forwarded Message
From: Michelle <[email protected]>
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.mac.office.word
Date: Thu, 05 Aug 2004 00:16:00 +0900
Subject: Characters changed in all my documents! Help!

I recently moved to a new G5 from my old G4. In many of my Word X documents
I have typed the following combination of characters:

-->

However, after the switch, EVERY instance of "-->" has become a
one-character diamond symbol! I assume this is a problem with the
preferences, but I didn't know intuitively which pref I should change to get
my "-->" all back! Do you know?

Thanks for your help!

Michelle
------ End of Forwarded Message

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Michelle,

I don't know what the "some reason" is; it's an anomaly that I've never
heard of before. All I can do is try to help you fix it.

It's possible that you're dealing with a corrupt Normal template, so the
first thing I would suggest is to test Normal:

Quit Word and navigate to your Normal template which should be in
~/Microsoft User Data/Normal. Rename Normal to something else (like
OldNormal), then relaunch Word. If this fixes the problem but you have
customizations, etc, in OldNormal that you want to maintain, you can use
Organizer to transfer those from OldNormal to the newly-created Normal
template. Then you can trash the old renamed file. To learn how to use
Organizer, see here (if you're using Safari you may have to refresh the page
a couple times): <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/MacWordNormal.htm>

If the new Normal inherits the problem, then you can trash it and rename the
OldNormal back to Normal.

Otherwise, try creating an AutoCorrect entry that replaces --> with --> (or
whatever) and see what happens. (I don't know why you have no entry already
for --> since it is a default listing.)

Hope something here helps.

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[Dayo Mitchell]

In addition, when I followed your instructions and typed "-->" in the
replacement box there was no entry for it in the list at all. Yet the
diamond symbol still is substituted for "-->" whenever I type it.

There might be a couple ways to control that; via Tools | AutoCorrect, look
on the AutoFormat As You Type tab, and see if unchecking the box re "replace
symbol characters" stops that happening.

Thanks for your advice, Beth. What I'd really like to know is what the
"some reason" is when you write, " What I think is happening is that the
arrow symbol is not available" I don't think it's a font problem since the
arrow symbol is, I believe, a Wingdings 3 font symbol and that font is
properly installed in my system.

Conceivably it could have corrupted on your system somehow? I think the OS
X includes some Font Utilities, try running them?

DM

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Michelle:

It's character number 61664 in the Wingdings font (and any other Unicode
font).

I suspect Dayo is correct: somehow you have lost access to Wingdings, Word
is falling back on Unicode, and you do not have that character available in
the Unicode fonts you have installed.

Try rebooting OS X. That forces a rebuild of the font cache, which should
then provoke a rebuild of the Microsoft Office font cache.

That might do it. If not, you may have to delete the MSO Font Cache then
re-install the Wingdings font.

Cheers

Thanks for your advice, Beth. What I'd really like to know is what the
"some reason" is when you write, " What I think is happening is that the
arrow symbol is not available" I don't think it's a font problem since the
arrow symbol is, I believe, a Wingdings 3 font symbol and that font is
properly installed in my system.

In addition, when I followed your instructions and typed "-->" in the
replacement box there was no entry for it in the list at all. Yet the
diamond symbol still is substituted for "-->" whenever I type it.

I'd appreciate any further insights you'd have on this!

Michelle





------ Forwarded Message
From: Michelle <[email protected]>
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.mac.office.word
Date: Thu, 05 Aug 2004 00:16:00 +0900
Subject: Characters changed in all my documents! Help!

I recently moved to a new G5 from my old G4. In many of my Word X documents
I have typed the following combination of characters:

-->

However, after the switch, EVERY instance of "-->" has become a
one-character diamond symbol! I assume this is a problem with the
preferences, but I didn't know intuitively which pref I should change to get
my "-->" all back! Do you know?

Thanks for your help!

Michelle
------ End of Forwarded Message

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410

 

[Klaus Linke]

It's character number 61664 in the Wingdings font (and any other

Unicode font).

Just a small remark: 61664 (a.k.a. U+F0E0) isn't really a "proper" Unicode
character.

It's in a code block that's reserved for "private use", and Word uses that
block from U+F000 to U+F0FF for any old symbol font.
All those fonts get F000 (= 61440) added to their old codes.
U+F0E0 in some symbol font used to have the code E0 (= 224 = character "à")
in pre-Unicode times..

In the "Symbol" font, 61664 is a diamond. So it definitely looks like a
font substitution problem, most likely caused by a missing or corrupted
Wingdings font.

Sometimes, I have seen it the other way round: "Wingdings" being
substituted for a missing "Symbol" font.

Greetings,
Klaus