Word 2004 + Macintel + Some Adobe OpenType Fonts = Crash on save

[John McGhie [MVP -- Word and Word Mac]]

Aron, you're worth more money! You may indeed have cracked it! That would
be a huge leap forward.

The Preview Picture is utterly without value to most folks: it just creates
file float and most people should have it turned off (seeinga low-res bitmap
of the first page of most documents does NOT add useful information: the
document title is often not even visible).

Cheers

 

[Gavin Lawrie]

While I don't have a cure, I DO have a work-around: disable saving the
preview picture for the documents already in use, and turn this option
off for all future work.

Hi Aaron,

Can confirm your work-around seems to work here on our iMacs. Sorry
for delay in responding - just back from vacation and saw message.
Will do more extensive testing tomorrow, and include our MacPro's - but
past experience suggests they behave identically to our Intel iMacs.

Wonderful find - not only will it fix our problem in short term
(assuming it scales) but also should make the finding of a cure quicker
too.

Regards and Thanks

Gavin Lawrie

 

[Beth Rosengard]

This is great news. I've passed your confirmation on to MSFT, Gavin (as
well as Aaron's OP a few days ago).

Thanks!

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***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/Mac/WordMacHome.html>
My Site: <http://www.bethrosengard.com>

 

[Scott Melendez]

Gavin,

Great summary of the issue. I have almost identical experience; I’m glad
someone is more organized than me to compile it.

Minion Pro is our default font for the Normal template, and we have quite an
investment in OpenType fonts. While I have access to Type 1 versions, it’s a
hassle I don’t want to do solely for Word.

Have you been able to test it with any other OT fonts?

 

[Gavin Lawrie]

Gavin,

Great summary of the issue. I have almost identical experience; I’m glad
someone is more organized than me to compile it.

Thanks

Minion Pro is our default font for the Normal template, and we have quite an
investment in OpenType fonts. While I have access to Type 1 versions, it’s a
hassle I don’t want to do solely for Word.

Have you been able to test it with any other OT fonts?

Yes - our other main font is the Adobe sold OT version of Linotypes
HelveticaNueue (sp) font. Same probls with that one.

However, good news broke just recently - a work around that stops
problem happening. Aaron G. spotted that if you turn off the 'save
preview picture with this document' that appears on the File |
Properties | Summary dialog box the problem goes away.

Presumably whatever the problem is, it is related to the preview
picture function.

We've tested this on our Macintel systems (iMacs and MacBookPros) and
it seems to work 100% of time. Kudos to Aaron for spotting this.
Fingers crossed that MS / Apple will use the insight to fix problem
soon.

HTH

Gavin Lawrie

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Beth:

May I assume you're putting this on the website? Or do you want me to do
so?

Cheers

Hi Gavin,

It's not necessary for you to repeat any details. I think Paul has gotten
confused. All of your relevant posts in this and the other two threads on
this subject have been passed on to MSFT by one or another of the MVPs and
if they hadn't been, they'd be available via Google Groups whether they were
still on the Microsoft server or not.

The information you have provided has been invaluable and I hope it leads to
a fix soon (though I have no inside knowledge to that effect)!

Regards,

Beth

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Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
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John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Aaron,

If you're still around to read this, please contact me privately. The email
address I'm using here is good.

Thanks,

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***Please always reply to the newsgroup!*** ... except in this case .

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/Mac/WordMacHome.html>
My Site: <http://www.bethrosengard.com>

 

[gruth]

Hi. I have some bad news.

While Aaron's method works for MOST of my documents, I'm still getting
the same hanging behavior (Word gives beachball, other apps quit, fonts
systemwide get weird) in some complex Word documents. In particular
anything with complex tables seems to hang the system. I'm happy to
send anyone a copy of a sample offending doc if they would like.

- Geoff

 

[Beth Rosengard]

<Damn!>

Passing this on to MSFT.

Thanks,

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
MacOffice MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/Mac/WordMacHome.html>
My Site: <http://www.bethrosengard.com>

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Geoff:

Yes, please: let's have a sample of one of those document. Please Zip of
Stuff it so it doesn't get damaged in transit.

Also: having turned OFF "Save preview picture..." make sure you make a
small change (add and delete a space...) then SAVE the document to remove
the preview image from the document

Cheers

Hi. I have some bad news.

While Aaron's method works for MOST of my documents, I'm still getting
the same hanging behavior (Word gives beachball, other apps quit, fonts
systemwide get weird) in some complex Word documents. In particular
anything with complex tables seems to hang the system. I'm happy to
send anyone a copy of a sample offending doc if they would like.

- Geoff

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Oooops... I was wrong...

1) Turn "Save preview..." OFF

2) Open document THAT WAS CREATED IN WORD 2004 and has a Preview

3) Save as new file ...

That gets rid of the Preview Image from within the document. After that,
you should be able to Save As normally.

Further testing indicates that this works ONLY with documents created in
Word 2004 for the Mac. I have a document here created in Word 2003 on the
PC. I can't get rid of the preview from those documents...

On the other hand, another user who has not applied the latest Office 2004
updates cannot get rid of existing preview images under any circumstances.

What remains to be proven is whether simply turning the Preview OFF solves
the problem, whether the preview remains in the document or not.

* If the problem is caused simply by the preview image being in the
document, then this work-around will not cure the problem.

* If the problem is that Word is attempting to WRITE TO the Preview, then
turning off the Preview preference will work.

Another strategy you can try is to "Maggie" the document. Copy all but the
last paragraph mark to a brand new document (with Preview turned OFF). That
will definitely remove the preview picture.

Hope this helps

Hi Geoff:

Yes, please: let's have a sample of one of those document. Please Zip of
Stuff it so it doesn't get damaged in transit.

Also: having turned OFF "Save preview picture..." make sure you make a
small change (add and delete a space...) then SAVE the document to remove
the preview image from the document

Cheers

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[Aaron G.]

Just to make sure it's related:

1) Does the behavior only happen at saving, or while editng the document?
2) Do these documents behave normally (no beachball) on PowerPC hardware?

I apologize in advance if you posted this info earlier and I looked right
past it.

Aaron Grice

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Aaron:

Yeah, I've asked Geoff for a copy of the document. There are certainly some
strange observations occurring.

While investigating Geoff's post, Beth and I discovered that there are
certain documents from which Word 2004 *can't* remove the Preview Image.

I think that these are documents *created* in PC Word. My observation is
that Word can remove previews only from documents created by Word 2004.
Beth can't confirm that finding.

If you attempt to use Word>File>Open to open documents, as you select each
one, you will see the Preview image in the right pane of the Open Dialog.
If the document has no preview image, the words "Preview not available" will
appear.

Curiouser and curiouser...

Just to make sure it's related:

1) Does the behavior only happen at saving, or while editng the document?
2) Do these documents behave normally (no beachball) on PowerPC hardware?

I apologize in advance if you posted this info earlier and I looked right
past it.

Aaron Grice

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[gruth]

Very interesting. When I "save as..." to a new file, Word still crashes
in the old way.

However, when I "maggie" it (as you term it), it works fine. I actually
just selected all test rather than the all-but-last-paragraph approach
you describe. That worked fine.

I'll still send a copy of one of these files.

- G

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Excellent!! Thanks for your report. And to Aaron for his persistence/luck
in discovering the work-around...

Been giddy as a schoolgirl since the news, and testing nonstop for over
an hour. The coup de grace, which I believe validates this workaround,
is that I had a thousand page document in Pages, which I then exported
to Word, which I then used the font I could 100% always say was
troublesome before (Bembo STD 11pt) and saved it again from Word...no
crash!!! Woo-hoo, thank you all!

PS - I also ran through a bunch of other Adobe OTF and Postscript fonts
and no crashes to report.

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Geoff:

Selecting "All Text" is NOT a Maggie, and does NOT have any particular
curative powers

The technique popularised by Margaret Secara of the PC Word List (and now
known the world over as "Doing a Maggie") is very specific: the damaged
information that causes Word document problems is stored in the Document
Properties.

The document properties reside in the file below the last paragraph mark in
the document. If you copy that last paragraph mark, you copy the problem


I'm looking at your file now...

Cheers

Very interesting. When I "save as..." to a new file, Word still crashes
in the old way.

However, when I "maggie" it (as you term it), it works fine. I actually
just selected all test rather than the all-but-last-paragraph approach
you describe. That worked fine.

I'll still send a copy of one of these files.

- G

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Hi Geoff:

OK, your document is inconclusive because:

A) I don't have Agaramond, so it was substituted on my system for Times New
Roman, which has so far not been known to cause problems.

B) I don't have a Macintel. You are one who knows WHY: I depend on Word
(and VBA) for my living...

C) Your document contains MathType equations within table cells. Both
tables and equations are "complex objects" and thus subject to corruption.

So it's possible that your document has one or more corrupt tables or
equations. If it does, copying to a new document may indeed fix the
problem.

Equations are "OLE Objects" which are stored in the same "Document
Properties" container as the Preview Picture. It may be that the Macintel
Preview Font Crash can be caused by equations as well as preview pictures.
It would be interesting to make a copy of one of your crashing documents and
remove from it only the equations...

It wouldn't fix anything, but if it cured the crashes, it would give us
another data point.

Cheers

Very interesting. When I "save as..." to a new file, Word still crashes
in the old way.

However, when I "maggie" it (as you term it), it works fine. I actually
just selected all test rather than the all-but-last-paragraph approach
you describe. That worked fine.

I'll still send a copy of one of these files.

- G

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[gruth]

1) Yes, only when saving.
2) Yes, the same files work fine on a G4 computer.

 

[gruth]

I don't think that the MathType eqns are relevant. I had the same
behavior with a file only containing a table (which I've sent to you
separately). However, I do agree that the file I sent you is certainly
complex.

I don't like the corrupt idea either, because I have NEVER had problems
with these files on a PPC machine. I routinely create complex files
like this, and I've never encountered this particular style of
crashing.

Also, to reiterate, when I copied the whole thing (select all) into a
new document with preview turned off, it saved fine.

 

[Scott Melendez]

Gavin (or anyone),

How many OTF fonts do you have installed vs. how many Word displays? With my
PowerBook, there seemed to be some arbitrary limit on the number of OpenType
fonts Office would display. Using a font manager didn’t improve matters, but
as I’ve cut down on the number of fonts, I’d like to start replacing the
Type 1 versions with the OTF (for better cross-platform exchange).