Wildcard replacements and Track Changes

[Klaus Linke]

Hi,

I'm trying to run some wildcard replacements with "Track Changes" on (so I
can later go through the changes and accept/reject them).

Say I have the text "abc", and replace "(a)b(c)" with "\1B\2".

Without "Track Changes", I expect -- and get -- "aBc".

With "Track Changes", I get "acB" (!?!).

Seems to be a bug... and the view settings (original/final) don't seem to
make a difference.
(Tested in Word 2003 and 2007)

Is there a way around that bug? Some setting I've overlooked?

I have a long list of replacements, where I want to replace some character
that appears between two specific other characters (or strings) with
something else.

I guess I could do several replacements, say
-- search for "abc", apply some weird font formatting like "Shadow",
-- replace "b" (+ format "Shadow") with "B"
-- remove format "Shadow"

But I'm still hoping for a simpler work-around...

Regards,
Klaus

 

[Neil Cumfer]

Yes, it does seem to be a bug ... the same thing happened to me.
I tested in Word 2007 and Word97

I would suggest using a macro that finds the texts you want to alter
but instead of using the Replace feature, it deletes the original texts
and types in the desired texts at the same place. When done this
way, "Track Changes" works correctly.

However, it is not clear that there is any advantage to using
"Track Changes" at all. As you point out, you have to go through
the changes one by one and decide whether to accept or reject
each one.

You can do essentially the same thing in the Replace dialog box.
If you want to keep the original text, click on the Find Next button.
If you want to make the substitution, click on the Replace button.
No need to wait until later.

 

[Klaus Linke]

Hi Neil,

Thank you... As you say, there doesn't seem a way around rewriting the
wildcard replacements.

You can do essentially the same thing in the Replace dialog box. [...]

There's about 50 of them, and they are part of a clean-up macro to prepare
documents for print.
The reason to use "Track Changes" is that I'd like to run the cleaning up
automatically, but still have a chance to hand-check any changes later on.
Most of the replacements are unlikely to apply in any given document --
They're fixing some typography mistakes that occasionally occur (insert
non-breaking spaces in abbreviations, use typographical quotes...).

Regards,
Klaus