<The document name or file path is not valid>

[Michelle M]

My battery died on my laptop the other evening and when I resumed working the
following day and opened Word 2002, I noticed the left column listed two
documents which had been "recovered". I did nothing other than close Word
and didn't worry about it since I had saved both documents just before my
battery died. When I attempted to go back into one of the documents though I
got the <The document name or file path is not valid> error message. This is
a book I am writing and I have not backed it up for over a week (I know, I
know). I can see the file there, and it still lists 480kb, but I cannot open
it no matter what I do. I have reviewed every support file with Microsoft
regarding this error message (i.e., SmartTags, etc.) and done everything they
suggest to no avail. I'm desperate! Does anybody have any suggestions???

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

For a start, clear out all your temp files. See
http://www.gmayor.com/what_to_do_when_word_crashes.htm. Then you might
reregister Word (at the Start | Run prompt, type "winword /r" (without the
quotation marks) and press Enter).

You might also try copying the document to another location or to a
removable disk. Then copy it back to a different folder and rename it. Then
try to open it. If all else fails, have you tried "Recover Text from Any
File"?