S
Scott Boettcher
From a phone, I bet.
PROBLEM: 12.1 version of Word 2008 will not open WinWord .doc files?
J
JE McGimpsey
Scott Boettcher said:
Phone, sure.
Also on-site, via email, video, remote sessions, the occasional house
call...
Fortunately for my time, my contracts are second-tier, rather than at
the front-line interface.
And, apparently fortunately, the on-site first responders report that
telling those users having problems with opening files to use File/Open,
rather than double-clicking, is being met with equanimity and
acceptance. I've only had one executive call me directly - and he seemed
to get it.
R
Richard_Starling
Scott said:
Phone, sure.
Also on-site, via email, video, remote sessions, the occasional house
call...
Fortunately for my time, my contracts are second-tier, rather than at
the front-line interface.
And, apparently fortunately, the on-site first responders report that
telling those users having problems with opening files to use File/Open,
rather than double-clicking, is being met with equanimity and
acceptance. I've only had one executive call me directly - and he seemed
to get it.
[/QUOTE]
JE, do those same users have the issue of not being able to double click an email attachment? If, like me, they have to save the attachment then go to Word and then do a File/Open I'm sure they wouldn't 'get it'. Everyone is assuming that MS have deprecated the WDBN file type, as far as I know there's nothing in the release notes and I still say that either MS did not test this properly or they have a blatant disregard for the usability of their software on the Mac platform. I have gone back to 12.0.1 and will not upgrade until this is fixed.
S
Steve Maser
JE said:
Your 1500 users clearly don't have thousands of documents extremely
deep within subfolder upon subfolder upon subfolder -- on multiple
server volumes, etc. You must not work in a higher-ed environment
where you have faculty with documents going back decades, etc...
It would be *less of a problem* if a user could drag-and-drop the
document on the Office application in the dock. But that's not even
an option.
- Steve
J
JE McGimpsey
Of course they do.
After the initial confusion (where we got a half-dozen or so calls), we
put out a message to the users reminding them to use File/Open, and we
haven't had a complaint since. Can't be 100% positive that all the desks
are updated yet, but the vast majority are.
FWIW, we also have regularly told them that they should, if they plan to
work on a document, save it first and work off the saved copy. That's
far more stable than editing docs in a temporary directory, and just
good practice.
Or, as has been stated many times, they didn't realize that third-party
applications were applying type codes that hasn't been applied by an MS
app during this century, and which in 99% of cases is *incorrect*.
It's a BUG, but in the third-party apps!
And FWIW, the WDBN file type has been deprecated since Office 98 when
the new type came out. Support for deprecated features are often carried
along by software developers for a version (or several), but in general,
removal of support for deprecated items is not typically announced in a
release note.
Well, living with dozens of bugs may work for you, and that's fine. It
doesn't for the users I support.
They'd rather be more productive than petulant.
J
JE McGimpsey
Steve Maser said:
K-12 to doctoral programs...
And yes, rat's nests of subfolders on dozens of servers. Spotlight is
their friend... and it works within File/Open!
Most users haven't been using XL or Word since 1984/5 (90% of the
students weren't even born then), but many have documents going back to
the early 90's at least. OTOH, they don't *use* those documents very
frequently.
In any case, go back much before 1988 and NO version of Word or XL can
open the 1.x docs, so it doesn't matter a bit.
But, as has been previously mentioned, that's largely irrelevant. Since
the third-party bug affects NEW documents that they touch, most of the
times we've seen the problem have not been with pre-Office98 docs..
Of course not! That's using the same OS X Launch Services path as
double-clicking...
R
Richard_Starling
FWIW, we also have regularly told them that they should, if they plan to
work on a document, save it first and work off the saved copy. That's
far more stable than editing docs in a temporary directory, and just
good practice.[/QUOTE]
Don't know anyone who works like this. Open the attachment document with a double click, review the contents and then discard or file in the appropriate place is the way almost everyone I know works.
You keep saying this but if they didnt know they didnt test it.
Disagree, if you are introducing incompatibility and usability issues then it should be flagged up to prospective users. By the way how do you explain that when I double click a Word email attachment the focus is passed from the email client to Word which simply sits there with an empty document and does nothing? Based on previous explanations Word should not be advertising its handling of WDBN file types and therefore focus should not be passed to it - or am I missing something?
I'm not being petulant, but for me this undocumented, unannounced change in behaviour constitutes the biggest problem with SP1 and far outweighs any bug fixes I get in return. I work for a computer services company and my users are definitely not as compliant as yours seem to be, and neither am I.
work on a document, save it first and work off the saved copy. That's
far more stable than editing docs in a temporary directory, and just
good practice.[/QUOTE]
Don't know anyone who works like this. Open the attachment document with a double click, review the contents and then discard or file in the appropriate place is the way almost everyone I know works.
You keep saying this but if they didnt know they didnt test it.
Disagree, if you are introducing incompatibility and usability issues then it should be flagged up to prospective users. By the way how do you explain that when I double click a Word email attachment the focus is passed from the email client to Word which simply sits there with an empty document and does nothing? Based on previous explanations Word should not be advertising its handling of WDBN file types and therefore focus should not be passed to it - or am I missing something?
I'm not being petulant, but for me this undocumented, unannounced change in behaviour constitutes the biggest problem with SP1 and far outweighs any bug fixes I get in return. I work for a computer services company and my users are definitely not as compliant as yours seem to be, and neither am I.
J
JE McGimpsey
Probably 98% of our users do to. But since they've been told the proper
procedure, they evidently try saving and opening when something doesn't
work. I can only infer from what we're seeing (or not seeing)...
It's apparently true that they didn't test what file types Eudora
assigns to Office documents. They also probably didn't test whether
Eudora did anything else to their files - that's Eudora developers'
responsibility. Same for FireFox.
I doubt they tested Fetch, InterArchy, Newswatcher, Transmit, MacSoup,
etc., for what file type those apps assign, either (though they may add
that to the protocol). Why would they - they've published the
specifications for 10 years now.
Granted, when enough users are screwed by a third party, sometimes the
only thing to do is come up with a workaround. I don't know if that can
or will be done in this case.
Other posts in these threads have addressed this better than I could.
OK. If your users don't get the value, there's no need to roll out the
SP.
It just seems like you're focusing on "undocumented, unannounced" part -
which has nothing to do with the problem itself.
Did your users really read the release documents? If so, they're more
far more compliant than you imply below. If not, you're making a
distinction without a difference.
True, if it had been discovered before release you might have been able
to address it in advance - but you can do that now.
I won't say my clients are *happy*, but at least for now, they're far
happier being able to use the Office features that were fixed.
C
Corentin Cras-Méneur
JE McGimpsey said:
I just tested roudn-tripping a file through Interarchy and the fule type
and creator are simply stripped.
Corentin
C
CyberTaz
Hi Richard -
I promised myself that I'd stay out of this melee but I simply can't resist
the temptation
It's not an assumption. One of the major points that many seem to overlook
(or choose to ignore) is that the WDBN file type was deprecated when Word 6
was introduced over 10 years ago and brought along a new format on both Mac
as well as PC. It's only those programs involved which have continued to
assign it to documents, and that's where the problem originates.
Simple question: How many people do you know who are still using the *same
version* of the *same email/browser* they were using 10 years ago? If the
involved software had been revised appropriately the number of affected
documents would be miniscule. Ergo, that's where the "fix" needs to be made.
I can't - and don't presume to - speak for MS, but FWIW there's no doubt in
my feeble mind that there will be no resurrection of that archaic, obsolete
file type by MS in any future update to Office 2008 - or ever. And even if
they did, it wouldn't change the fact that the affected document would still
have the same - more serious problem - of being incorrectly coded.
Why some seek to hold MS accountable for the irresponsibility of other
developers I simply can't fathom. Ironically, if MS *did* attempt to control
those developers they'd be taking just as much flak - if not more - for
that... And from regulatory agencies as well as from users.
I'm not unsympathetic to the inconvenience, but your decision is tantamount
to cutting off your nose to spite your face, throwing the baby out with the
bathwater, or any number of other platitudes one might choose to apply to
the circumstances. By staying at 12.0.1 you're depriving yourself of all the
other fixes & improvements provided by the 12.1.0 update - any of which
[IMHO] outweigh that one issue and are detailed in several of the posts
scattered among the various threads on the subject. If you missed them - or
can't find them - you might want to have a look at what those changes are:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952331/en-us
Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
I promised myself that I'd stay out of this melee but I simply can't resist
the temptation
It's not an assumption. One of the major points that many seem to overlook
(or choose to ignore) is that the WDBN file type was deprecated when Word 6
was introduced over 10 years ago and brought along a new format on both Mac
as well as PC. It's only those programs involved which have continued to
assign it to documents, and that's where the problem originates.
Simple question: How many people do you know who are still using the *same
version* of the *same email/browser* they were using 10 years ago? If the
involved software had been revised appropriately the number of affected
documents would be miniscule. Ergo, that's where the "fix" needs to be made.
I can't - and don't presume to - speak for MS, but FWIW there's no doubt in
my feeble mind that there will be no resurrection of that archaic, obsolete
file type by MS in any future update to Office 2008 - or ever. And even if
they did, it wouldn't change the fact that the affected document would still
have the same - more serious problem - of being incorrectly coded.
Why some seek to hold MS accountable for the irresponsibility of other
developers I simply can't fathom. Ironically, if MS *did* attempt to control
those developers they'd be taking just as much flak - if not more - for
that... And from regulatory agencies as well as from users.
I'm not unsympathetic to the inconvenience, but your decision is tantamount
to cutting off your nose to spite your face, throwing the baby out with the
bathwater, or any number of other platitudes one might choose to apply to
the circumstances. By staying at 12.0.1 you're depriving yourself of all the
other fixes & improvements provided by the 12.1.0 update - any of which
[IMHO] outweigh that one issue and are detailed in several of the posts
scattered among the various threads on the subject. If you missed them - or
can't find them - you might want to have a look at what those changes are:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952331/en-us
Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
S
Steve Maser
JE said:
I beg to offer up my scenario which is clearly different from yours..
If you've been using one of the "third-party" applications since the
pre-Office 98 days (and Eudora has been around for about a decade now,
I think, and was -- at one point -- considered one of the "premiere"
Mac E-mail programs...)
You'd likely have a significant number of files received via e-mail
(flaged as "Microsoft Word 1.x-5.x document" files) -- those have type
WDBN and Creator MSWD.
I also have Word document files (openable by Word 12.1) that have type:
"W6BN" (a Word 6.0/95 document) with creator MSWD and no extension.
Were these e-mailed to me 8 years ago? Probably... For all I know,
they came on floppy disk...
And those can be opened by "File --> Open" -- so they are valid word
files according to 12.1, but not double-clickable.
And that's just on *my* computer where I have no documents later than
1997 (my home computer probably does...) This isn't touching the
faculty computers that their documents have been moved from
computer-to-computer from even longer than that...
- Steve
S
Scott Boettcher
Bugs in 3rd party apps?
LOL
Docs created with MS Office on PC
Docs sent via Exchange server to Entourage/MS Webmail users.
Files fail to open with double-click.
Where's the third-party software, JE?
That's the best one yet.
Are you really Steve Balmer?
Your methods or best practices may work in some Bank of America environment,
but not where I work.
Scott
LOL
Docs created with MS Office on PC
Docs sent via Exchange server to Entourage/MS Webmail users.
Files fail to open with double-click.
Where's the third-party software, JE?
That's the best one yet.
Are you really Steve Balmer?
Your methods or best practices may work in some Bank of America environment,
but not where I work.
Scott
S
Steve Maser
JE said:
Firefox 2.x? Thunderbird 2.x?
Why weren't those tested? They aren't "old" by any means...
(And I realize, "you don't know" is an acceptable answer)
Fetch 5.3 blanks things out, btw. Even non-blanked files uploaded and
then downloaded..
So what *is* right? "blank" file types? "current" file types (with
no guarantee that the same thing won't happen with Office 15 8 years
down the road?)
Really -- the continued silence from the MacBU on this is troublesome.
- Steve
J
JE McGimpsey
Steve Maser said:
"Irrelevant" was a bad choice of words.
My intended point was only that since the user has no control over how
documents are touched before they get to his or her machine, even if one
were to do a painless and error-free batch conversion of all your old
doc types, and strictly eschew the offending applications, the problem
would still exist.
S
Steve Maser
Scott Boettcher said:
Hey Scott...
Really?
What file type is Entourage putting on the Word documents? WDBN?
Not W8BN (or "blank"?)
(And, yes, Firefox 2.x certainly should have been tested -- there's
little excuse for not testing that after 14 revisions of the Firefox 2
code base of a "not-10-year-old app"...)
- Steve
J
JE McGimpsey
Scott Boettcher said:
Well, if not bugs, at least failure to follow decade-old specifications.
Which don't HAVE Mac file types, and therefore (AFAICT) aren't assigning
bad ones...
So far, Eudora and Firefox have been directly shown to cause the
problem.
Perhaps I've missed it, but I've not seen any reports of problems that
have been documented here to involve files that have ONLY been touched
by the above MS apps (including the templates they're created from), and
I can't recreate the problem on the systems that I have access to. Nor
have I had any user reports of that occurring.
No. I just try to help users sort out problems.
J
JE McGimpsey
Steve Maser said:
And that's the only one I can give...
I couldn't agree more.
S
Scott Boettcher
JE, my point was that our workflow is all MS, and the docs are not
"double-clickable"
No third-party stuff here.
They all worked fine before 12.1.
Did EXCH break it?
Did some PC version of Office break it?
Or did the 12.1 update break things?
I'm not mad at you, but I am mad that people here seem to think USERS should
pay the price for this.
Finding and using Open/File is not acceptable.
I don't even like/accept it and I get what's going on.
When you deal with people who have deals to make; contracts to create/edit
and time is of the essence, this is stupid.
I don't care why - if 12.0 and 12.0.1 can open these docs, so should 21.1
and 21.2 etc.
Still no reason for this, and the MS site still calls this an "issue"
It IS an issue.
Scott
"double-clickable"
No third-party stuff here.
They all worked fine before 12.1.
Did EXCH break it?
Did some PC version of Office break it?
Or did the 12.1 update break things?
I'm not mad at you, but I am mad that people here seem to think USERS should
pay the price for this.
Finding and using Open/File is not acceptable.
I don't even like/accept it and I get what's going on.
When you deal with people who have deals to make; contracts to create/edit
and time is of the essence, this is stupid.
I don't care why - if 12.0 and 12.0.1 can open these docs, so should 21.1
and 21.2 etc.
Still no reason for this, and the MS site still calls this an "issue"
It IS an issue.
Scott
R
Richard_Starling
Perhaps I've missed it, but I've not seen any reports of problems that
JE, you've hit the nail on the head! We live in a world where interoperability and usability are key. You cannot expect everyone buying and using Office 2008 (or Office 2007 on Vista) to be using a complete MS stack (much as MS would like us to). Scott is absolutely right, this isn't acceptable and no amount of justification will change that.
JE, you've hit the nail on the head! We live in a world where interoperability and usability are key. You cannot expect everyone buying and using Office 2008 (or Office 2007 on Vista) to be using a complete MS stack (much as MS would like us to). Scott is absolutely right, this isn't acceptable and no amount of justification will change that.
J
JE McGimpsey
Neither can a major software vendor leave security vulnerabilities open
just because someone else is making non-standard changes to their files.
That too is unacceptable and unjustifiable.
It's a balancing act, but in general, I'd prefer my vendors err on the
side of making the other guys fix *their* broken stuff.
I don't know, but I would guess that there's a lot of discussion at
MacBU right now about how much *system* testing needs to be added to
their protocols.
And how much the price of Office 14 will increase because of it...