Help: Word 98 for Mac: Characters Bunch Up & Overlap

[rafael montserrat]

Hi Beth, Dayo & John M and others

For the last couple of days Word 98 seems to be working correctly. The
problem isn't happening. going systematically through date/topic sequence of
feedback I got from the newsgroup, I think the fix happened at the point of
Beth's reply;

"Sept 16 8:01 Templates & Normal Settings
'My next suggestion would be to test your Normal Template and Word Settings
files as follows: ...'"

Thanks for all your input.

Rafael

 

[Dayo Mitchell]

Glad to hear it. Hope the fix holds.

Dayo

Hi Beth, Dayo & John M and others

For the last couple of days Word 98 seems to be working correctly. The
problem isn't happening. going systematically through date/topic sequence of
feedback I got from the newsgroup, I think the fix happened at the point of
Beth's reply;

"Sept 16 8:01 Templates & Normal Settings
'My next suggestion would be to test your Normal Template and Word Settings
files as follows: ...'"

Thanks for all your input.

Rafael

 

[rafael montserrat]

Rafael
OS 9.2.2
Word 98

Hi Beth,

The problem has returned and I'm retracing the steps you and others gave me
because Word 98 has been working correctly for a month.

In your post of Sept 16 03 you gave me a url for "learning the Organizer":

<http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/WordMac/MacWordNormalTemplate.htm>

The title of that page is Word X Normal Template. The document contains the
word 'organizer' a number of times, but the article does not have
'organizer' in the title. Also the article is written for word X. I have w
98. Will the information in this article apply to Word 98?

Thanks, Rafael




From: Beth Rosengard <[email protected]>
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.mac.office.word
Date: Tue, 16 Sep 2003 10:58:40 -0700
Subject: Re: Help: Word 98 for Mac: Characters Bunch Up & Overlap


Hi Rafael,

My next suggestion would be to test your Normal Template and Word Settings
files as follows:

1) Quit Word and navigate to your Normal template which should be in
Applications> Microsoft Office 98> Templates. 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 (use IE not Safari to view this
site): <http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/WordMac/MacWordNormalTemplate.htm>

If this doesn't fix the problem, quit Word again, trash the new Normal and
rename OldNormal back to Normal.

2) To test your Preference files, quit *all* Office Applications.
Navigate to your System folder> Preferences> Microsoft folder. Rename the
Word Settings (8) file. When you restart Word, the files will be recreated.
If all is well, you can trash the old file. You will have to reset some
Preferences and AutoCorrect settings.

If this doesn't help, you can trash the new file and rename the old one
back.

One other thing: Does this happen with only one particular document? If
that's the case, it may be corrupt. Turn on Show/Hide Formatting (the
backwards paragraph symbol), copy all but the very last paragraph mark of
the document and paste it into a blank new Word document. Do a Save.

It's not always easy to track down oddball problems like yours. I hope
something here helps.

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/WordMac/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/toc.html>




On 9/16/03 1:35 AM, in article BB8C7BE7.2A94%[email protected], "rafael

In July of 2003 I wrote: "characters will overlap or bunch up every ten
minutes." see below for my original email.*

Beth Rosengard gave me the following fix which I have done carefully as per
instructions but to no avail in solving the problem.

"You need the updaters listed at the URL below (not counting the optional
ones) plus the Microsoft Office 98 SSL Security Updater:
<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/resources/resources.aspx?pid=resourcekits&rk=o
fficex&article=/mac/download/misc/make_office_current.xml#98>"

I have downloaded the updaters "not counting the optional ones". Then I
installed them in the order instructed.

As I write my book, the problem becomes increasing bothersome and I fear
loss of material.

Can someone or Beth elaborate on a fix.

Rafael

*Original email:
"In a word document, every ten minutes or so, some characters will overlap,
or bunch up. The temporary cure for this is to put the cursor on that line
anywhere and space forward and back, only one space seems necessary. Then
the characters return to normal.

The other thing that happens, not always with characters bunching up, is
that when selecting a word, the highlight doesn't just stay on that word,
but will cover half of the previous word making it impossible to move or
copy or cut the word I selected. Again this is remedied by the process
described above.

This is happening so often that it is very irritating. There is something
flawed in the application program. I have yet to uninstall and reinstall
word. Is anyone familiar with this phenomenon and it's cure?"

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Rafael,

Sorry to be so long responding. I've been off the newsgroups for a few
days.

I know that the article you refer to works equally for Word 2001 as for Word
X. I would *think* that it also applies to Word 98. The easiest way to
find out is to try it!

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/WordMac/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/toc.html>

 

[rafael montserrat]

Thanks Beth. I figured you were on a break. Rafael

 

[rafael montserrat]

Hi Beth et. al.

The fix on word 98 lasted a month, then reverted to the original problem. I
have so much feedback from you guys that I'm wading through it to try to fix
the problem permanently.

Here are two Items I'm stuck on. The first may or may not be related to the
permanent fix I'd like to get.
1. I'm stuck with "old Normal" template and I can't get that maneuver to
work to get a "normal" template back.
2. The template "envelope" has disappeared.

Rafael

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Rafael,

If you renamed Normal to OldNormal, then when you reopen Word, a new Normal
will be automatically created and you can trash OldNormal if the fix works.
If you want to restore OldNormal instead, just trash the new Normal and
change the name of OldNormal back to Normal. NOTE: All of this should be
done with Word closed.

What do you mean by the template "envelope"?

--
Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/WordMac/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/toc.html>