Constant crashes and instability

[bodsham]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: intel

I am trying to use Word to finish a manuscript of 120,000 words. It crashes constantly if I try to do a global search and replace. The error message is always similar... This is on a Mac Pro 2 gb RAMDual Core 2.66 so I would not think it has anything to do with resources.

18/03/2008 21:30:40 com.apple.launchd[174] ([0x0-0x1a01a].com.microsoft.Entourage[215]) Stray process with PGID equal to this dead job: PID 839 PPID 1 Microsoft Error

This is happening to me on a daily basis and frankly I am starting to doubt whether Word is, as they say, 'fit for purpose', since it actually seems to be a lot less reliable than 2004 was on a PPC machine.

This is for information principally. I have deleted my original normal template already, which seemed to be causing some initial problems when I first installed 2008. I'm not really sure what else I can do except use another product since a word processor that crashes two or three times a day isn't worth pursuing.

 

[bodsham]

Sorry - posted wrong error message - as you can see it also affects Entourage too. The Word message is....

19/03/2008 09:58:12 com.apple.launchd[200] ([0x0-0x4f04f].com.microsoft.Word[802]) Stray process with PGID equal to this dead job: PID 1002 PPID 1 Microsoft Error

Nothing else on this machine crashes at all.

 

[John McGhie]

OK, we need to do a bit of analysis to discover whether the crashes are
caused by "Word", or the "Document", or the "Template", or the
"Preferences".

1) First let's construct a test document. Restart your computer, then open
Word and, in the blank document that appears, type =rand(200,10) and press
"Enter".

That will give you 18,000 words of Quick Brown Foxes (or Lorem Ipsums...).
Copy it all and then Paste ten times to bring you up to 250 pages, 180,000
words.

2) Save the document in .docx format, and give it a file name.

3) Now run a Find/Replace to replace every "quick" with "slow".

4) Save the document.

If the Save completes correctly, your Normal Template and Preferences and
Word itself are "probably" OK, so come back here and we'll de-louse that
document.

If not, come back here and tell us what happened (in great detail!) so we
can help you work through the various causes.

Hope this helps

Sorry - posted wrong error message - as you can see it also affects Entourage
too. The Word message is....

19/03/2008 09:58:12 com.apple.launchd[200]
([0x0-0x4f04f].com.microsoft.Word[802]) Stray process with PGID equal to this
dead job: PID 1002 PPID 1 Microsoft Error

Nothing else on this machine crashes at all.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[bodsham]

Thanks for that. The test works fine. When/if it happens again I will try to describe it but it seems very random and has to do with save/replace. Also I am up against time here and it's very tempting to drop the whole thing into Pages, where it works fine, and is faster to be honest.
What with my copy of Vista randomly deauthorising itself yesterday, the auto authorisation service not working, and MS's phone customer service people being unavailable - effectively killing a whole Vista install - I am not feeling much love for Redmond right now.

 

[John McGhie]

That means it's the "Document"

A Maggie will probably fix it

1) Create a new blank document

2) Carefully select all of the text in the bad document EXCEPT the last
paragraph mark

3) Copy it.

4) Paste in the new document.

5) Save under a new file name and close all, then re-open.

This technique for de-corrupting is known as "Doing a 'Maggie'", after
Margaret Secara from the Word PC-L mailing list who first publicised the
technique.

How are you running Vista? Bootcamp? I have it running here in Parallels
and it hasn't blown up YET!! However, if you are running it in Bootcamp,
make sure you have all the hard disks mounted before you authorise.

Otherwise it thinks it has been copied to a new computer and it will
deauthorise. The volume serial number of the disks is one of the things the
Activation mechanism uses to make sure it hasn't been bootlegged

For a problem like that, ring the Phone Activation number, not the Support
Line. The phone activation people work 24 x 7 x 365-1/4, and they can sort
this out for you without going to Support.

Cheers

Thanks for that. The test works fine. When/if it happens again I will try to
describe it but it seems very random and has to do with save/replace. Also I
am up against time here and it's very tempting to drop the whole thing into
Pages, where it works fine, and is faster to be honest.
What with my copy of Vista randomly deauthorising itself yesterday, the auto
authorisation service not working, and MS's phone customer service people
being unavailable - effectively killing a whole Vista install - I am not
feeling much love for Redmond right now.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[bodsham]

Actually I ran Cocktail and restarted. Since then it's been as good as gold, as has Entourage. But if it happens again I will certainly try this. I don't thin Leopard is as stable as Tiger generally. A friend of mine just got a brand new MacBook Pro and has Office 2008 on that - and he is finding a few problems too.
I won't waste people's time with Vista here except to give details as requested. It's in VMWare and was running fine. Yesterday there was some massive update. When it rebooted it first told me I had to change the password, then that the activation had expired. It wouldn't activate with the number I have because it's 'in use'. And I just can't get through to anyone on the phone side of things however long I hang on. Happily it isn't vital for me...

 

[bodsham]

One Vista addition.. I just tried again, once again the tedious automated activation system doesn't work, and when I tried to talk to a customer service rep I was told they were too busy, I had to call back later.. and then I got cut off. So I hope you don't get hit by this either....

 

[John McGhie]

OK, if Vista is in a Virtual Machine, AND you have just applied Service Pack
1, it has changed your Internet Firewall settings.

You need to persuade Vista that the network it can see now should be
"trusted".

Resolve that issue first, then the automated Activation system can actually
get out to the server, and it should give a better result

Hope this helps

One Vista addition.. I just tried again, once again the tedious automated
activation system doesn't work, and when I tried to talk to a customer service
rep I was told they were too busy, I had to call back later.. and then I got
cut off. So I hope you don't get hit by this either....

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[bodsham]

Thanks for the firewall tip. It activates now though it still tells me ;this copy of Windows is not genuine'. Reading other experiences of this Vista SP I am very glad I don't have to rely on it day to day.

The good news is that Word has behaved perfectly since I ran Cocktail (or maybe it just decided to run perfectly of its own accord).

 

[Toby Dodwell]

I have Microsoft 2008 & everything seems to be working fine apart from Word which when you go to open it up the program screen appears then it fails to load & crashes. A window comes up and says "Microsoft Word has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience. If you ask for more information this Microsoft Error Reporting log appears. Can anyone help?

Microsoft Error Reporting log version: 2.0

Error Signature:
Exception: EXC_BAD_ACCESS
Date/Time: 2008-03-22 13:29:42 +0000
Application Name: Microsoft Word
Application Bundle ID: com.microsoft.Word
Application Signature: MSWD
Application Version: 12.0.1.080305
Crashed Module Name: MicrosoftOffice
Crashed Module Version: unknown
Crashed Module Offset: 0x004fcde0
Blame Module Name: MicrosoftOffice
Blame Module Version: unknown
Blame Module Offset: 0x004fcde0
Application LCID: 1033
Extra app info: Reg=en Loc=0x0409

Thread 0 crashed:

# 1 0x02c22de0 in _MsoHrATSUIScriptShape + 0x0000060C (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004fcde0)
# 2 0x02c22dc0 in _MsoHrATSUIScriptShape + 0x000005EC (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004fcdc0)
# 3 0x02c2a4b4 in _TextOutA + 0x00000634 (MicrosoftOffice + 0x005044b4)
# 4 0x02c23fa8 in _GetTextMetricsA + 0x0000005C (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004fdfa8)
# 5 0x00996a18 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x0066DFF8 (Microsoft Word + 0x00995a18)
# 6 0x0099715c in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x0066E73C (Microsoft Word + 0x0099615c)
# 7 0x00688bd0 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x003601B0 (Microsoft Word + 0x00687bd0)
# 8 0x00af7ae0 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007CF0C0 (Microsoft Word + 0x00af6ae0)
# 9 0x00b0029c in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007D787C (Microsoft Word + 0x00aff29c)
# 10 0x02c01a6c in __WlmMain + 0x00000050 (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004dba6c)
# 11 0x00ae4dcc in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007BC3AC (Microsoft Word + 0x00ae3dcc)
# 12 0x00002ee0 in __mh_execute_header + 0x00001EE0 (Microsoft Word + 0x00001ee0)
# 13 0x00002be4 in __mh_execute_header + 0x00001BE4 (Microsoft Word + 0x00001be4)

PPC Thread State:
srr0: 0x02c22de0 srr1: 0x0200f030 vrsave: 0x00000000
xer: 0x20000000 lr: 0x02c22dc0 ctr: 0x9012ad5c mq:0x00000000
r0: 0x02c22dc0 r1: 0xbffff420 r2: 0x00000000 r3:0x00000000
r4: 0x00000000 r5: 0xa0293128 r6: 0x0000000a r7:0x00000001
r8: 0x00010000 r9: 0xffffffff r10: 0xffffffff r11:0xa0b8cf6c
r12: 0x9012ad5c r13: 0x00000000 r14: 0x00000000 r15:0x00000000
r16: 0x00000000 r17: 0x00000000 r18: 0x00000000 r19:0x00000000
r20: 0x00000000 r21: 0x00000000 r22: 0x01410000 r23:0xbffff6e8
r24: 0x00000000 r25: 0x00000000 r26: 0xfffffff6 r27:0x059c1ec8
r28: 0x059c2920 r29: 0x00000000 r30: 0x059c1f88 r31:0x02c22cec

Thread 1:

# 1 0x900411f8 in _mach_wait_until + 0x00000008 (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x000411f8)
# 2 0x90040fc4 in _nanosleep + 0x00000184 (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x00040fc4)
# 3 0x90040dec in _sleep + 0x0000008C (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x00040dec)
# 4 0x0179e5b0 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000A94 (merp + 0x000025b0)
# 5 0x0179dc98 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x0000017C (merp + 0x00001c98)
# 6 0x0179dd64 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000248 (merp + 0x00001d64)
# 7 0x0179e76c in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000C50 (merp + 0x0000276c)
# 8 0x9002bd04 in __pthread_body + 0x0000005C (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x0002bd04)

PPC Thread State:
srr0: 0x900411f8 srr1: 0x0000f030 vrsave: 0x00000000
xer: 0x00000000 lr: 0x90040fc4 ctr: 0x900411f0 mq:0x00000000
r0: 0xffffffa6 r1: 0xf00807d0 r2: 0x01fc90d7 r3:0x0000001a
r4: 0x74a5b463 r5: 0x00000028 r6: 0x00000000 r7:0x00000000
r8: 0x90041128 r9: 0x00000000 r10: 0x000f4240 r11:0xa0006c10
r12: 0x900411f0 r13: 0x00000000 r14: 0x00000000 r15:0x00000000
r16: 0x00000000 r17: 0x00000000 r18: 0x00000000 r19:0x00000000
r20: 0x00000a07 r21: 0x00000002 r22: 0xf0080e08 r23:0x00000001
r24: 0x901c0e50 r25: 0xf00808b0 r26: 0xa0010e50 r27:0xa0010e50
r28: 0x000000

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Toby:

I am going to take a wild guess here and suggest that it's falling over
trying to load a font it doesn't like.

I see you have applied the 12.0.1 patch. I assume you ran Disk Utility and
Repaired Permissions? I assume that you also re-started the computer to
cause it to rebuild its font caches? If not, do these now.

If the problem is still with you, I need to know whether Word 2008 has EVER
run properly since you installed it. If not, we need to nuke all the
preferences.

If Word used to work and now it doesn't -- as a quick test, move out all
fonts that were not supplied by Microsoft or Apple with your current
computer (simply so we know we have verified Unicode-compatible fonts in use
that they have tested with).

Now see if there is any change?

I have Microsoft 2008 & everything seems to be working fine apart from Word
which when you go to open it up the program screen appears then it fails to
load & crashes. A window comes up and says "Microsoft Word has encountered a
problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience. If you ask for
more information this Microsoft Error Reporting log appears. Can anyone help?

Microsoft Error Reporting log version: 2.0

Error Signature:
Exception: EXC_BAD_ACCESS
Date/Time: 2008-03-22 13:29:42 +0000
Application Name: Microsoft Word
Application Bundle ID: com.microsoft.Word
Application Signature: MSWD
Application Version: 12.0.1.080305
Crashed Module Name: MicrosoftOffice
Crashed Module Version: unknown
Crashed Module Offset: 0x004fcde0
Blame Module Name: MicrosoftOffice
Blame Module Version: unknown
Blame Module Offset: 0x004fcde0
Application LCID: 1033
Extra app info: Reg=en Loc=0x0409

Thread 0 crashed:

# 1 0x02c22de0 in _MsoHrATSUIScriptShape + 0x0000060C (MicrosoftOffice +
0x004fcde0)
# 2 0x02c22dc0 in _MsoHrATSUIScriptShape + 0x000005EC (MicrosoftOffice +
0x004fcdc0)
# 3 0x02c2a4b4 in _TextOutA + 0x00000634 (MicrosoftOffice + 0x005044b4)
# 4 0x02c23fa8 in _GetTextMetricsA + 0x0000005C (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004fdfa8)
# 5 0x00996a18 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x0066DFF8 (Microsoft Word +
0x00995a18)
# 6 0x0099715c in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x0066E73C (Microsoft Word +
0x0099615c)
# 7 0x00688bd0 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x003601B0 (Microsoft Word +
0x00687bd0)
# 8 0x00af7ae0 in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007CF0C0 (Microsoft Word +
0x00af6ae0)
# 9 0x00b0029c in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007D787C (Microsoft Word +
0x00aff29c)
# 10 0x02c01a6c in __WlmMain + 0x00000050 (MicrosoftOffice + 0x004dba6c)
# 11 0x00ae4dcc in _wdCommandDispatch + 0x007BC3AC (Microsoft Word +
0x00ae3dcc)
# 12 0x00002ee0 in __mh_execute_header + 0x00001EE0 (Microsoft Word +
0x00001ee0)
# 13 0x00002be4 in __mh_execute_header + 0x00001BE4 (Microsoft Word +
0x00001be4)

PPC Thread State:
srr0: 0x02c22de0 srr1: 0x0200f030 vrsave: 0x00000000
xer: 0x20000000 lr: 0x02c22dc0 ctr: 0x9012ad5c mq:0x00000000
r0: 0x02c22dc0 r1: 0xbffff420 r2: 0x00000000 r3:0x00000000
r4: 0x00000000 r5: 0xa0293128 r6: 0x0000000a r7:0x00000001
r8: 0x00010000 r9: 0xffffffff r10: 0xffffffff r11:0xa0b8cf6c
r12: 0x9012ad5c r13: 0x00000000 r14: 0x00000000 r15:0x00000000
r16: 0x00000000 r17: 0x00000000 r18: 0x00000000 r19:0x00000000
r20: 0x00000000 r21: 0x00000000 r22: 0x01410000 r23:0xbffff6e8
r24: 0x00000000 r25: 0x00000000 r26: 0xfffffff6 r27:0x059c1ec8
r28: 0x059c2920 r29: 0x00000000 r30: 0x059c1f88 r31:0x02c22cec

Thread 1:

# 1 0x900411f8 in _mach_wait_until + 0x00000008 (libSystem.B.dylib +
0x000411f8)
# 2 0x90040fc4 in _nanosleep + 0x00000184 (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x00040fc4)
# 3 0x90040dec in _sleep + 0x0000008C (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x00040dec)
# 4 0x0179e5b0 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000A94 (merp + 0x000025b0)
# 5 0x0179dc98 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x0000017C (merp + 0x00001c98)
# 6 0x0179dd64 in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000248 (merp + 0x00001d64)
# 7 0x0179e76c in _MerpCreateSession + 0x00000C50 (merp + 0x0000276c)
# 8 0x9002bd04 in __pthread_body + 0x0000005C (libSystem.B.dylib + 0x0002bd04)

PPC Thread State:
srr0: 0x900411f8 srr1: 0x0000f030 vrsave: 0x00000000
xer: 0x00000000 lr: 0x90040fc4 ctr: 0x900411f0 mq:0x00000000
r0: 0xffffffa6 r1: 0xf00807d0 r2: 0x01fc90d7 r3:0x0000001a
r4: 0x74a5b463 r5: 0x00000028 r6: 0x00000000 r7:0x00000000
r8: 0x90041128 r9: 0x00000000 r10: 0x000f4240 r11:0xa0006c10
r12: 0x900411f0 r13: 0x00000000 r14: 0x00000000 r15:0x00000000
r16: 0x00000000 r17: 0x00000000 r18: 0x00000000 r19:0x00000000
r20: 0x00000a07 r21: 0x00000002 r22: 0xf0080e08 r23:0x00000001
r24: 0x901c0e50 r25: 0xf00808b0 r26: 0xa0010e50 r27:0xa0010e50
r28: 0x000000

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Sydney, Australia. S33°53'34.20 E151°14'54.50
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]