Layout changes Word 2K to Word 2K3

[Ron Hinds]

A co-worker is having a strange problem. He has two machines on his desk -
one has Office 2003 loaded on it, but the other still has Office 2000 on it.
He has resisted allowing me to upgrade the second machine because some of
his Word documents' layout changes when he opens them in Word 2003. The
common thread in those documents that exhibit the problem is his use of
textboxes in those documents. When opened in 2003, the page is always
shifted down halfway, i.e., the top half of the page is blank and the
textbox begins at that point. The second half of the (original) page is cut
off; it doesn't bleed over to the next page, which also exhibits the same
issue. Clicking in the whitespace in the top half of the page does not
produce a flashing cursor. We don't see any settings in the textbox
formatting that would produce this effect. Although I am the IT person here,
I am by no means a Word expert - in fact, this user is far better with Word
than I am ;-). Any help would be appreciated!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Assuming no change in Compatibility Options, only a change in printer driver
would explain this.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Ron Hinds]

Thank you for your reply. Can you please explain what you mean by
"Compatibility Options"?

Another curious thing: On the View menu, Print Layout is chosen by default.
If I change the View to Normal, everything disappears. All I get is three
blank lines. If I remove those lines in Normal view (Ctrl-A, Del), then
switch back to Print Layout view, everything disappears.

Again, thanks so much for your reply!

 

[Ron Hinds]

Update: It's fixed! The problem was in Page Setup (I started looking there
after you suggested a printer driver problem). For some reason, the Page
Header was set to Center. I changed it to Top and all is good!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Tools | Options | Compatibility. These settings are document specific, so
there is no reason they would change if you move a document from one system
to another; if you did change them from Word 2000 to Word 2003, there could
be repercussions. In this case, the printer driver is a more likely culprit;
see http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/TextReflow.htm

From your description, everything in your document is in the drawing layer
(objects in the drawing layer are not displayed in Normal view). The text
must be in text boxes anchored to those empty paragraphs (blank lines). If
you delete the paragraphs, you delete everything anchored to them.

I see now that you do mention text boxes in your original post. You might
check to make sure that the vertical alignment of the pages is not set to
Center (File | Page Setup | Layout), which might explain the odd alignment.
Objects in the drawing layer cannot break across pages, so a text box that
is moved down the page will run off the bottom as described. If the position
of the text box is defined relative to the paragraph (Format | Text Box |
Layout | Advanced), you might have better luck if it's specified relative to
the page or margins.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I felt it had to be that, but I can't imagine how the Page Setup could get
changed just moving it from one system to another.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org

 

[Ron Hinds]

Thanks for all your help!

I felt it had to be that, but I can't imagine how the Page Setup could get
changed just moving it from one system to another.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org