Conflicting character counts

[Eric]

I’m working on a document that’s being reviewed and revised by multiple people.

One of the reviewers has done a character count on Word for Mac 2004,
getting 112K characters. I’ve done a count on Word for Windows 2003, getting
71K.

Any idea why there’s a difference?

Thanks.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Is everybody agreed on whether the count is with or without spaces?

 

[Eric]

Yes, the count is with spaces.

It occurred to me that it might relate to whether the deleted text was
counted.

I did a test on Word for Windows 2003, showing Final vs. Final Showing
Markup. I got the same thing (71K characters including spaces). I accepted
all changes and got the same number: 71K.

But then did a copy and paste (Paste Special – Unformatted Text) into
another document, which includes both the new text and the deleted text. That
showed me the 112K number, which is what the reviewer using Word for Mac 2004
reported.

That answers the question as to where the difference comes from. Of course,
it doesn’t answer the question why the character count functionality would be
designed to work differently on Word for Windows 2003 and Word for Mac 2004.

On the WORD-PC list, someone wrote "And I have noticed major differences
between Word 2003 and 2007. I had to wrestle with this last fall. I didn't
have time to report the problem on list--but I did note it."

Word is full of unpleasant surprises!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Makes sense. That is, what you describe reasonably explains the discrepancy.
It doesn't explain the reason for the discrepancy. <g>