Increasing Document Size - 20+Mb

[PurpleChrome]

Word 2003:
My original document started out at 88 pages and just under 9Mb. This is a
living document and is being updated, added to or deleted from on a regular
basis. The document is a policy & standards manual. My document is now over
20Mb in size, taking longer to load, longer pauses for auto-save, etc.

The number of pages has actually decreased from 88 to 84 over the past year.

Why is this happening? Is there junk in the doc that I can get rid of? If
so how?
How much more disk space is it going to use over the next few years ?

Thanks!
.. . . / DALE

 

[Graham Mayor]

You could start by making a copy of your document, then using that as a
basis, create a new document based on the same template, then copy and paste
all but the last paragraph mark from the copy into the new document and save
that. If you have multiple sections in your document, it may be worth
copying each section separately, without the section break, and re-add the
section break. If you have 'versions' turned on turn it off. If you have
illustrations, link them instead of embedding them.

There is no autosave in Word - only autosave recovery information. If you
want something more reliable, see
http://www.gmayor.com/automatically_backup.htm and
http://www.gmayor.com/save_numbered_versions.htm

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


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[PurpleChrome]

Graham,
this resolution is ridiculously simple.
My document is now down to <1 Mb, even less than when I first started.
BUT, why does this happen? What type of garbage is being stored in the
document to make it grow like that?
Thank you! Thank you!
.. . . / DALE

 

[Graham Mayor]

It doesn't always do the trick, but it is a good starting place All the
extraneous formatting information is stored in the area at the end of the
file and can become bloated or corrupt. By copying all but that final
paragraph mark you leave all the bumph behind and start with a clean sheet.

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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


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