normal.dot grows endlessly larger every time

[Jess Jackson]

I am running Office 2003. I have noticed that my normal.dot grows every
single time I exit Word even though I have "ask before saving
normal.dot" checked and reply "no." I do not have fast save enabled
which seems to be a culprit in some cases.

It seems to grow by about 40-KB (estimated) every time I open and close
Word, even doing only that without opening a document.

I tried renaming normal.dot (which had grown to over 10-MB). Word, as I
should, I assume, regenerated a new normal.dot of about 85-k. But just
opening and closing Word even thought I answered "no" to the save
normal.dot file grows the normal.dot by about 40-k.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Jess

 

[Jess Jackson]

Hi Again:

I have disabled all templates and add-ins (renaming them something other
than .dot) and uninstalled the remove hidden data tool. Starting with a
Word regenerated normal.dot, it still grows at 40-kb or so per start or
stop of Word even if I answer "No" to saving it.

Just as a test, I changed the normal.dot to "read only." That stopped
the inflation but that is no real fix as I create macros from time to time.

 

[Beth Melton]

If you're still being prompted to save changes to Normal.dot then you
may have missed an add-in.

Here's an article that should help you troubleshoot this issue
further:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA011514521033.aspx

Also, if you are creating a lot of macros then you may want to place
them in a global template (a Word template in the Startup folder)
instead of utilizing Normal.dot for everything. A global template is a
little more protected than Normal.dot and less suitable to corruption.

I personally use a combination of the two, a global template
containing macros and AutoText I know I want to keep and I'll use
Normal.dot for new macros and such I'm not sure about.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/

 

[Jess Jackson]

Hi Beth:

That was a VERY helpful article. I have bookmarked it for future use.

It turns out the culprit was the Microsoft Redaction add-in. I have no
idea if mine just got corrupted or there is some problem with it in my
particular configuration. Removing the redaction tool in Control Panel -
Add/Remove Programs fixed it.

Fortunately, I have no real current need for this tool, so I will leave
if off my system.

Thanks for the help.

Jess

 

[Beth Melton]

Glad to hear you found the problem.

Finding the Redaction add-in as the cause doesn't surprise me. It
sounds like you had the older version of the Redaction Add-in
installed. The first release had a major issue - it would add the menu
items to multiple menus and as I noted in my article, although not a
virus, it did exhibit virus-like qualities and that is what caused
your Normal.dot to bloat. You may want to check your Tools menu and
various shortcut menus. If you find the Redaction tools then you
should recreate Normal.dot.

Another way of knowing which version you had installed is the presence
of the a global template for the Redaction tool in your
Tools/Templates and Add-ins list. If you didn't see this template
listed (I don't recall the exact file name off-hand) in your initial
troubleshooting then you definitely had the older version. They
corrected the original issue by loading a template containing their
custom menus/toolbars so the new version uses both a COM Add-in and a
global template. IOW, if you find you need it then you can try
installing the newer version.

Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/