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

[skitzer]

We have been working with Apple on fixing this problem with our
Postscript fonts.
We were told today that is has been fixed and will be in the 10.4.8
update. Are there any developers who have access to the pre-release
builds that could test it?
I do not know if this will also fix OpenType fonts.

-Tracy

 

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

Hi Geoff:

Well, again I see nothing much wrong with your second document either (the
one without the equations...).

However, what I was trying to find out was what was causing the problems
with the documents you have problems with. Removing equations is a first
step. Equations are a very complex OLE object which corrupts easily. If
you remove the equations and the problem does not go away, it wasn't that!
We have a data point

You said the problem is fixed by copying into a new document, not Maggying.
That means the problem is not certain kinds of document property corruption.
If it had been corrupt document properties, what you did would not have
fixed the document but a Maggie would do so. We get another data point

My next suggestion after removing the equations would have been to rebuild
each of the tables. The second document you sent also had tables in it.
Tables are another complex object that corrupts easily. If we convert each
of the tables to text, then back to a table again, that might fix the
problem. If it does, we have another data point. If copying all of the
text to another document fixes the problem, then it is *likely* that the
problem is corrupt tables.

But if that did not fix the probem either, then the problem would seem more
likely to be the Agarramond font.

I also routinely create documents far more complex than these two, so as you
say, there is no particular reason why this document should fail. I've
tested your documents in Word 2004 on a G4 and Word 2003: I can't see any
reason they should fail. So I am strongly suspicious that the problem is
the ATS Font Crash issue.

BTW: This thread is mis-titled. This bug is not related to Adobe fonts or
OpenType fonts per se. It's the presence of certain glyphs in *a font used
in the document*, no matter how they are encoded (we have reports in TTF,
OTF and PostScript) . The problem has so far been reported in fonts from
Adobe and LinoType, but not Apple or Microsoft ones. Of course, that
doesn't mean that Apple and Microsoft fonts are immune, it just means nobody
has reported the problem in fonts from those suppliers yet!

The problem does not appear to occur if the document does not include a
Preview Image. Save Preview Image seems to be the installation default in
Mac Word 2004, which is why this problem is quite widespread.

Hope this helps

--

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

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.

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

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


On 27/8/06 11:31 AM, in article C1173306.44749%[email protected], "John

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


On 27/8/06 5:36 AM, in article
(e-mail address removed), "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


--

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

--

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

 

[Beth Rosengard]

I have a suggestion here. Is it possible that one of you other folks on
MacIntels/Word 2004 would be willing to test Geoff's problem docs on your
systems and see if you too get the crashes? If you do *not*, using the very
same doc(s) (and with the Preview preference turned off), then that would be
another data point (as John says . Specifically, it would eliminate
anything idiosyncratic to Geoff's system as the cause of the crashes.

Geoff: Any problem sending one of the "crash" docs to another user to test?

If Geoff is okay with this, are there any volunteers?

--
***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>

 

[Elliott Roper]

I have a suggestion here. Is it possible that one of you other folks on
MacIntels/Word 2004 would be willing to test Geoff's problem docs on your
systems and see if you too get the crashes? If you do *not*, using the very
same doc(s) (and with the Preview preference turned off), then that would be
another data point (as John says . Specifically, it would eliminate
anything idiosyncratic to Geoff's system as the cause of the crashes.

Geoff: Any problem sending one of the "crash" docs to another user to test?

If Geoff is okay with this, are there any volunteers?

I'll give it a go. I had to send my first Mac Pro back. It was DOA. But
I expect the next one early next week. I am very interested in getting
to the bottom of this problem pretty quickly.

If it is supposed to be fixed in OS X 10.2.8 I will be one of the first
to test it. I don't have a developer seed, but I see no reason not to
leap straight into it as soon as it is public. My new machine won't be
carrying too much historical baggage.

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Great. Geoff, what do you say?

Thanks, Elliott.

Beth

P.S. You meant OS X 10.4.8, I'm sure. But you'd test it first in the
current 10.4.7, right?

 

[Elliott Roper]

Great. Geoff, what do you say?

Thanks, Elliott.

Beth

P.S. You meant OS X 10.4.8, I'm sure. But you'd test it first in the
current 10.4.7, right?

Oops yes, and yes respectively.
PS my mouseless Word essay is coming along nicely. Putting my money
where my mouse was, I'm trying to write it without. That is harder than
I thought it would be.

 

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

{Chortle} Most pilots would suggest that aircraft are easier to fly if you
leave all those knobs and levers and dials where the manufacturer put them,
too

Oops yes, and yes respectively.
PS my mouseless Word essay is coming along nicely. Putting my money
where my mouse was, I'm trying to write it without. That is harder than
I thought it would be.

--

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

 

[Elliott Roper]

PS my mouseless Word essay is coming along nicely. Putting my money
where my mouse was, I'm trying to write it without. That is harder than
I thought it would be.

{Chortle} Most pilots would suggest that aircraft are easier to fly if you
leave all those knobs and levers and dials where the manufacturer put them,
too

Yebbut Yebbut. I trust Airbus and Boeing to put the right number of
knobs in the right places.

 

[Beth Rosengard]

As long as you don't gag on it <g>.

Beth

 

[Elliott Roper]

I'll give it a go. I had to send my first Mac Pro back. It was DOA. But
I expect the next one early next week. I am very interested in getting
to the bottom of this problem pretty quickly.

OK. It's BAAACK! (simple unseated memory on riser. I feel >this big< I
should have been able to see that and fix it myself.)

I have just installed Word on it, and have not yet customised it back
to Elliott's preferences from hell. I have tried to make a crasher, but
it won't. (Left save preview on, and included some OTF text in a 40
page document)

This machine is in an interesting, almost virginal, state. If there is
a sequence of tests anyone wants me to make, speak now, before I muddy
the water too much. I don't mind leaving Office in a funny state for a
few days, but don't hang back too long.

Even in Rosetta emulation Word is quick. (2.66 Mac Pro with 4GB of
memory. It whoops this little Powerbook.

 

[Beth Rosengard]

OK. It's BAAACK! (simple unseated memory on riser. I feel >this big< I
should have been able to see that and fix it myself.)

I have just installed Word on it, and have not yet customised it back
to Elliott's preferences from hell. I have tried to make a crasher, but
it won't. (Left save preview on, and included some OTF text in a 40
page document)

This machine is in an interesting, almost virginal, state. If there is
a sequence of tests anyone wants me to make, speak now, before I muddy
the water too much. I don't mind leaving Office in a funny state for a
few days, but don't hang back too long.

Even in Rosetta emulation Word is quick. (2.66 Mac Pro with 4GB of
memory. It whoops this little Powerbook.

Geoff seems to be MIA <shrug>. John McGhie: Don't you have one or two of
Geoff's problem docs that you could forward to Elliott?

Beth

 

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

Hi Beth:

I deleted them, they never crashed for me (in 10.3.9).

I'll have a look at work and see if I saved them there...

Cheers

Geoff seems to be MIA <shrug>. John McGhie: Don't you have one or two of
Geoff's problem docs that you could forward to Elliott?

Beth

--

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

 

[Elliott Roper]

I have a suggestion here. Is it possible that one of you other folks on
MacIntels/Word 2004 would be willing to test Geoff's problem docs on your
systems and see if you too get the crashes? If you do *not*, using the very
same doc(s) (and with the Preview preference turned off), then that would be
another data point (as John says . Specifically, it would eliminate
anything idiosyncratic to Geoff's system as the cause of the crashes.

Geoff: Any problem sending one of the "crash" docs to another user to test?

If Geoff is okay with this, are there any volunteers?

OK, Beth snuck me a copy of Geoff's crasher, and it didn't. I carefully
added potentially troublesome fonts, retesting as I went, till I
finally had the full set of fonts I use, and all of my global templates
and preferences and autocorrect files and dictionaries and still it
won't crash. While writing this out, I had one more go, changing the
font in the normal style to Adobe Garamond Premier Pro (regular)
It 'crashes' on save. The symptoms were roughly as previously reported.
in detail:
Save did not proceed. There was a lot of disk activity on the disk I
thought it was trying to save to, the beach ball did not spin (I have
never seen that before) and then Safari crashed. I was able to grab a
screen shot before force quitting Word, which stopped the disk
activity. I rebooted after that, not feeling particularly confident of
the state of the system. It is the first time *ever* I have seen one
application crash another in OS X.

Save preview picture with new documents was unchecked. Geoff's
original crasher did have a preview, but the crash was on a save-as.

I repeated the Garamond Premier Pro experiment on a "Maggied" version
of the document and it did not crash Safari and saved-as at normal
speed. The document I pasted it into was a fresh 'un, with no preview.

(Geoff, I guess that was the equivalent of engraving my results on 1"
plate ;-) )

OK then. I'd really like to help getting this resolved. If anyone wants
me to try further experiments, I'm keen to do so, out of enlightened
self-interest, before I get too much valuable cruft on this new
machine.

--

 

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

Hi Elliott:

It's impressive, isn't it

This is not "one application crashing another", it's one application
triggering a crash in the OS's ATServer which handles all PostScript and
thus display-drawing duties.

So actually, this error is taking out the OS, which will leave all the other
applications feeling somewhat unwell and abandoned

I saw there was a QuickTime patch recently: did you put that in? That's how
I would expect them to ship the update that fixes this...

Cheers

OK, Beth snuck me a copy of Geoff's crasher, and it didn't. I carefully
added potentially troublesome fonts, retesting as I went, till I
finally had the full set of fonts I use, and all of my global templates
and preferences and autocorrect files and dictionaries and still it
won't crash. While writing this out, I had one more go, changing the
font in the normal style to Adobe Garamond Premier Pro (regular)
It 'crashes' on save. The symptoms were roughly as previously reported.
in detail:
Save did not proceed. There was a lot of disk activity on the disk I
thought it was trying to save to, the beach ball did not spin (I have
never seen that before) and then Safari crashed. I was able to grab a
screen shot before force quitting Word, which stopped the disk
activity. I rebooted after that, not feeling particularly confident of
the state of the system. It is the first time *ever* I have seen one
application crash another in OS X.

Save preview picture with new documents was unchecked. Geoff's
original crasher did have a preview, but the crash was on a save-as.

I repeated the Garamond Premier Pro experiment on a "Maggied" version
of the document and it did not crash Safari and saved-as at normal
speed. The document I pasted it into was a fresh 'un, with no preview.

(Geoff, I guess that was the equivalent of engraving my results on 1"
plate ;-) )

OK then. I'd really like to help getting this resolved. If anyone wants
me to try further experiments, I'm keen to do so, out of enlightened
self-interest, before I get too much valuable cruft on this new
machine.

--

--

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. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410

 

[Elliott Roper]

Hi Elliott:

It's impressive, isn't it

This is not "one application crashing another", it's one application
triggering a crash in the OS's ATServer which handles all PostScript and
thus display-drawing duties.

So actually, this error is taking out the OS, which will leave all the other
applications feeling somewhat unwell and abandoned

You are right that the OS is in the middle. I was whinging about the OS
not crashing cleanly, but staying up long enough for Word's failed
activity to take out Safari and anything else that is lying around.

I saw there was a QuickTime patch recently: did you put that in? That's how
I would expect them to ship the update that fixes this...

I now have QT 7.1.3 in. Geoff's crasher still crashes it, once I change
normal's font to Garamond Premier Pro and perform a save-as.

I'd be a bit narked if Apple sneaked a fix in via Quicktime. They
should be as open as possible about something that blows up the OS.
Lots of people will avoid QT7 so they don't lose their QT Pro licence.

 

[gruth]

Not that I put a lot of stock in apple-related rumors, but this one
cites 10.4.8 as an update that addresses "MS Word and OpenType fonts":
http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/01/apple-seeds-mac-os-x-10-4-8-to-developers/

I guess we'll just wait to see when this next system update drops...

 

[Elliott Roper]

Not that I put a lot of stock in apple-related rumors, but this one
cites 10.4.8 as an update that addresses "MS Word and OpenType fonts":
http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/01/apple-seeds-mac-os-x-10-4-8-to-developers/

I guess we'll just wait to see when this next system update drops...

Yep, I'm checking software update every day.

That article you cited was interesting. The fleeting reference to our
problem was almost a cut and paste from the discussion here.

PS Your chemistry classes look like fun.

PPS Does "Maggification" work for you? As in "to Maggie": Create a less
corrupt document by copying all bar the last pilcrow into a fresh one.

It worked on your assignment sheet here. However, I got my first kernel
panic on the Mac Pro shortly after trying it again. Word/ATSUI *may*
have dropped a banana skin on the pavement.

 

[gruth]

Yes, it works.

Actually, I just select all, copy the text, paste into a new document.
I'm told this isn't technically a maggie, but it work for me.

Something even weirder is that with a few old Word documents, the
program has started to crash (in the weird way we're all talking about)
even before I save. It's not consistent, but seems limited to certain
documents that have a lot of chemical equations and thus text
formatting in them.So far it's only happened with a couple files, and
as I said, it's not consistnet -- but when it occurs, the same crash
cascade involving other applications occurs.

This thing just keeps getting weirder.

 

[Clive Huggan]

Good to know that copying all the text including the last paragraph mark
worked in this instance, Geoff, but for other contexts it's very important
to acknowledge the significance of making a selection without the final
paragraph mark if you want to remove the most frequently occurring sources
of document corruption.

It's not the actual paragraph mark itself that is significant but rather the
several hundred instructions relating to the document that lie, invisibly,
beyond that final paragraph mark. De-selecting the final paragraph mark
(Command-a then Shift-LeftArrow is the most reliable way), then copying and
pasting the selection into a new blank document allows the new document to
provide the new [uncorrupted] end-of-document instructions.

So the difference between what you have done and doing the same without the
last paragraph mark is way beyond being a "technical" difference -- albeit
you've discovered that the end-of-document instructions weren't involved in
this instance.

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is 5-11 hours different from the US and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
============================================================

Yes, it works.

Actually, I just select all, copy the text, paste into a new document.
I'm told this isn't technically a maggie, but it work for me.

Something even weirder is that with a few old Word documents, the
program has started to crash (in the weird way we're all talking about)
even before I save. It's not consistent, but seems limited to certain
documents that have a lot of chemical equations and thus text
formatting in them.So far it's only happened with a couple files, and
as I said, it's not consistnet -- but when it occurs, the same crash
cascade involving other applications occurs.

This thing just keeps getting weirder.

 

[gruth]

Clive,

Yes, I am aware of the difference between the two. I didn't specify
that I was aware of the difference -- I do think it's interesting that
selecting all and copying doesn't include the preview image or whatever
it is that causes Word to go apeshit.

- Geoff

Good to know that copying all the text including the last paragraph mark
worked in this instance, Geoff, but for other contexts it's very important
to acknowledge the significance of making a selection without the final
paragraph mark if you want to remove the most frequently occurring sources
of document corruption.

It's not the actual paragraph mark itself that is significant but rather the
several hundred instructions relating to the document that lie, invisibly,
beyond that final paragraph mark. De-selecting the final paragraph mark
(Command-a then Shift-LeftArrow is the most reliable way), then copying and
pasting the selection into a new blank document allows the new document to
provide the new [uncorrupted] end-of-document instructions.

So the difference between what you have done and doing the same without the
last paragraph mark is way beyond being a "technical" difference -- albeit
you've discovered that the end-of-document instructions weren't involved in
this instance.

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is 5-11 hours different from the US and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
============================================================