Corrupted / [Badly] Recovered file

[Jean-Pierre]

Hello,

I run on W2K - SP4 / WORD2002 - SP3

I am writing a document containing many equations (+/- 100 as of now), +/- 40
pages long. I use the WORD Equations Editor, though I have loaded the "Math
Type" Editor for trial, which now runs in "Lite Mode", as I do not find it adds
anything usefull to the the default editor. The ".doc" file weighs about 1,900
kb.

I cannot cut the document in smaller ones, as there are cross-references all
over the document : chapters numbers, equation numbers, figure numbers.
Chapters, equations and figures are numbered automatically.

I suppose I should uninstall the "Math Type" editor it to get rid of it, but
that is not the problem, at least I think so.

Since a few days, when I try to save the document, I often get the famous
message about WORD having encoutered an unknown error and having to close. WORD
proposes to "recover" the open file. However, when I do that, all the equations
are transformed into "pictures", preventing me from subsequently editing them if
need arises. (I am building the document and need to review it to get the typing
errors out of it, including in the equations). This error happens several times
per session. And it worsen : lately, every two out of three save actions !

I am aware of the problem of converting equations into pictures, so I do not ask
for recovering and instead rely on file saved manually.

However when I re-open the manually saved version, I feel that I am far from
getting the last (manually) saved version of the document. I am missing
modifications that I am sure I saved manually before the "Unexpected Error".

Can anybody tell me how I can be sure that the modifications I made are really
written to the disk ?

Also is there any way to minimize the risk of getting that "Unexpected error" ?

By the way, the save options ("Tools"/"Options"/"Save") "Allow background
saves" is ON, "Allow fast saves" is OFF.

Thank you very much.

Jean-Pierre
Belgium

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Jean-Pierre, see what happens if you try these other tricks for fixing
corrupt documents, instead of Word's recovery--test ON A COPY of your doc.

1) copy the entire thing, *excluding* the last paragraph mark, into a new
document. That last paragraph mark holds a lot of information which can
get corrupted, and copying the text into a document with a fresh one
keeps your formatting, but can fix some glitches. A paragraph mark is a
¶. Click on ¶ on the standard toolbar to show nonprinting characters,
including paragraph marks.

2) the Save as Webpage and Back as described here:
http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/AppErrors/CorruptDoc.htm

If you can uncorrupt your doc without losing your equations as such,
that should prevent future problems.