Unexpected font-changes

[John Gough]

I find that several (well, four in all) long documents written in an
earlier version of Word and which all used to behave without any
problems have suddenly started under Word in Office XP to open in an
unexpected font for no apparent reason. Three of them are to a
specially-set-up template, the fourth to normal.dot. No other
documents seem to be affected. (All the documents involve quite a lot
of manual formating for book-titles, references, quotations, etc --
the sort of things that can't be handled very readily under pre-set
styles.) Can anyone suggest what might be happening, please, and if
there is any possible cure to make sure that what is set up stays set
up as it should?

 

[Klaus Linke]

Hi John,

One thing to look into is "Tools > Compatibility > Font substitution".
Some fonts were removed in Office2003. Maybe you can install them from your
old version, or choose better substitutes in the dialog.

Greetings,
Klaus

 

[John Gough]

One thing to look into is "Tools > Compatibility > Font substitution".
Some fonts were removed in Office2003. Maybe you can install them from your
old version, or choose better substitutes in the dialog.

Thanks, Klaus. It isn't that -- the font I used in the documents in
question was Arial (which I use as a default), and that is still there
all right.

 

[Klaus Linke]

Hi John,

Can you tell what the "unexpected font" is?
Maybe the document loads the style definitions from the attached template?
(Tools > Templates and Add-Ins, remove the check mark in "Automatically
update styles")

If the font changes while you enter new stuff, it might also be some foreign
language support. Asian languages often use a different font (which is also
defined in the style), and if Word decides that you are typing something in
Chinese, it may change the font.

Greetings,
Klaus

 

[John Gough]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004 12:54:41 +0100, "Klaus Linke"

Hello, Klaus.

Can you tell what the "unexpected font" is?

It's normally Times New Roman, though on occasion others have
appeared.

Maybe the document loads the style definitions from the attached template?
(Tools > Templates and Add-Ins, remove the check mark in "Automatically
update styles")

I've just done that and I'll watch what happens. I note that this
appears to be a global setting -- if I turn "Automatically update
styles" off it affects not just the older documents I was asking about
but also any new documents I create as well. I take it there is no way
of being selective?

If the font changes while you enter new stuff, it might also be some foreign
language support. Asian languages often use a different font (which is also
defined in the style), and if Word decides that you are typing something in
Chinese, it may change the font.

No, it's never changed whilst I've actually been entering new stuff.
(I'm spared that problem at least! )

 

[Stefan Blom]

The "Automatically update" setting in the Tools>Templates
and Addins dialog box affects only the current document,
unless you use File>Save As when you create new documents,
in which case the setting is inherited by the new
document.

Stefan Blom

 

[Stefan Blom]

It has been discovered that the "Automatically update
document styles" setting can actually be saved with a
template. The only way to turn this off is by using VBA.
For example:

1

 

[Stefan Blom]

Response continued...

1. Open the template as a document, using File>Open.

2. Start the VBA Editor (Tools>Macro>Visual Basic Editor).

3. In the VBA Editor, select View>Immediate Window. In the
Immediate Window, type

ActiveDocument.UpdateStylesOnOpen = False

and press ENTER.

4. Finally, save and close the template file.

NOTE: For more information about the "Automatically update
document styles" feature, search the google archives at:

http://www.google.com/advanced_group_search

Stefan Blom