Hyperlinks to Other Files - Don't want files opened alone

[Sharon_wv]

Hello. I am hoping that someone on this board, who knows a whole lot more
than I do in Office can help me. I'll give background & history & then my
question to make sure you understand what I'm trying to do.



Background. I need to turn over a file of about 40 documents to a court. I
have all the files electronically and can submit them to the court
electronically. However, I need to ensure that before anyone can view the
files the person accessing the file sees a message ".... under protective
order...."

History. In the past, all files were in hard copy. On every single page of
every single document there had to be a stamp "..... protective order...."

Additional Background: I am trying to come up with a scheme that will allow
me to share the documents with the ".. .protective order...." on them WITHOUT
having to physically stamp each page of every document & then scan every
single document. What I have been trying to do is do a master index in a
Word document that contains the "..... protective order....." statement &
then would have hyperlinks to all of the individual files via the hyperlink.
I do not want the user to be able to go to the individual file and have the
ability to open it (at which point they would not see the "...... protective
order ... " stamp) and this is unallowable.

1) Is my scenario that I've been trying to do possible? If it is, can you
explain how? The only other issue I foresee happening is that the hyperlinks
won't work once I send the files via email because someone else can save them
in a different location, correct?

2) Is there some other method in which I can have that " ... protective
order..." message be shown upon opening an individual file? Maybe like a
popup or something? If so, would that work in all Office applications and
..pdf files (since some of my files are .pdf files.

Any insight and help would be significantly appreciated!! Please let me
know if you need any additional background information

 

[Michael Roder]

Have you tried using a watermark? I have used them with previous versions of
Word.

 

[Sharon_wv]

Michael -
I considered putting watermarks on the original files, but did not want to
mess with the original, signed documents. If that ends up being my only
alternative, I might end up doing that in the end. Thanks for the input. I
appreciate it.

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

Have you looked at Format, Background, Printed Watermark, Text Watermark ?

Seems that'd do what you want (though if you send the original DOC files, anyone
could open and change them). You could add the watermark then make PDFs of the
documents though.

 

[Beth Melton]

FWIW this is my suggestion as well: to add a watermark and then make PDFs of
the documents.

As noted, if hyperlinks are used then one could open the documents directly
without using the "master" document. The only way you add a popup is to use
a macro and those can be easily bypassed -- even without the user realizing
they are bypassing macros.

If you have Office 2007 then the ability to save a document as a PDF built
into the applications. (Sort of, you need to download a free add-in if it's
not already installed). If you are using a previous version then there are
several free PDF writers available, such as CutePDF Writer.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile/Melton
What is a Microsoft MVP? http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/gp/mvpfaqs

Guides for the Office 2007 Interface:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/training/HA102295841033.aspx