Metadata Removal

[Gary Haugen]

Does anyone know of a good macro/addin/third party program/anything that
selectively removes metadata from word 03/07 documents? We have tried to
use Microsoft's add in, but it strips all of what it classifies as metadata
(such as comments and tracked changes).

We are a law firm and regularly need to send out documents which contain
comments and tracked changes, but we don't want metadata such as version
numbers, author, editing time and file location to be included in the
document.

Ideally the solution would function automatically at documents save or,
another possiblity, would be one that scans documents when being sent as
attachments from outlook (not outlook express).

Thanks for your help.

Gary Haugen

 

[Herb Tyson [MVP]]

In Word 2007, you have a good deal of control. Click Office Button -
Prepare - Inspect Document. Check only the types of information you want
removed, then click Inspect, Remove, etc.

To make this work automatically, you could record the desired behavior in a
macro, and perhaps put it onto the QAT, calling it "Prepare for Client" or
somesuch.

The method that the new command uses is not available in Word 2003. You
would need to write a more detailed macro. For starters, I would try
recording a macro in Word 2003 that "watches" you purging the document
properties.

In any event, the hard part would be getting people to use the tool(s) you
set up. That's always the kicker.