Meta data removal?

[menotnuts]

Does anyone know of any software to get rid of metadata from Word,
especially removing metadata from a Word/excel/power point file
attached to an Entourage e-mail? There are several products for
Windows, but not for Mac. I know about setting preferences, but there
are still many things that aren't getting removed (hyperlinks, styles,
VBA codes, etc). I also know about PDF format, and but sending PDF's
isn't an option. Thanks - Art

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

I don't think hyperlinks, styles, and VBA is meta data--that's all part of
the doc. I always thought meta data was the information about who edited it,
for how long, etc.

Anyhow, sounds to me as though a Save As in plain text format should do what
you want, at least for Word. Excel, save as comma-delimited; PPT I haven't a
clue.

DM

 

[John McGhie]

Art:

The things you mention are not "meta Data" they are "Content".

A Word document cannot exists without "Styles". You can change it so that
only one style is applied: Normal style, but it's still a style.

If you then apply formatting, Word will create each format you apply as a
style: that's how Word does formatting.

Save to plain text if you want to remove these things (but "Why would you
want to?").

Cheers

Does anyone know of any software to get rid of metadata from Word,
especially removing metadata from a Word/excel/power point file
attached to an Entourage e-mail? There are several products for
Windows, but not for Mac. I know about setting preferences, but there
are still many things that aren't getting removed (hyperlinks, styles,
VBA codes, etc). I also know about PDF format, and but sending PDF's
isn't an option. Thanks - Art

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410

 

[roberto]

I don't want to step on Art's question, but I was wondering if he means
the issue where Word documents contain fragments of data from other
files on your machine. There are many programs in the Windows world
that strip that out, but especially if you do "fast saves," your Word
documents have bits of many other, previously deleted, documents.

Microsoft's answer has been to (1) turn off fast saves and (2) if it's
extremely critical, to send the document as a pdf.

Is that what you were asking, Art? And if not, can anyone "official"
tell me whether this issue has been resolved in Office 2004?
Robert Brockman

 

[John McGhie]

I didn't think Art's question actually did concern the "Metadata". I think
Art wants to remove hyperlinks, styles and VBA from his documents: these are
"content", not "metadata". The function of the tools being sold for Windows
Word was built-in to Word in Word 2003 (Windows) and Word 2004 (Mac).

Yes, the issue can be resolved in Office 2004, but to do so, the user must
switch Fast Saves off, "Remove personal information" and and "Warn... Track
changes" ON.

If they do the last two, there is a downside: tracked changes, comments and
compare documents is disabled for that document, and their documents will
open and print a bit slower (because pre-resolved references to things such
as templates and printer drivers are removed). That's what the extra
information is for: to make those features work.

Turning Fast Saves OFF has always been a good idea, and actually speeds up
the document (because the resulting file size is smaller). Fast Saves has
always been disabled on the network anyway, because a file server won't
permit opening a file in "Append" mode.

Cheers

I don't want to step on Art's question, but I was wondering if he means
the issue where Word documents contain fragments of data from other
files on your machine. There are many programs in the Windows world
that strip that out, but especially if you do "fast saves," your Word
documents have bits of many other, previously deleted, documents.

Microsoft's answer has been to (1) turn off fast saves and (2) if it's
extremely critical, to send the document as a pdf.

Is that what you were asking, Art? And if not, can anyone "official"
tell me whether this issue has been resolved in Office 2004?
Robert Brockman

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410