Word 2008 (Mac) crashes on old .doc files, does not "recover" properly

[Neo Geshel]

A client of mine has a strange problem. She has just moved to a Mac
within the last six months. Her copy of Word 2008 appears to be crashing
whenever she begins to edit an old word doc from Office 2003 (from her
old PC).

However, she has also begun experiencing crashes involving brand-new
docx files.

In addition, these crashes do not “recover†properly. Theapp says that
it will re-start with a saved copy of what she was working on, but when
the app gets back up and running there is nothing - no document, no
auto-saved copy, nothing except a blank, new page.

Any suggestions on what might be happening?

She lives about an hour and a bit away from me, so I am not going to
visit for a few days, but I would love to have some sort of a
clue/answer for her once I make the trip.

Any and all help would be appreciated.
TIA.
...Geshel

PS, reposted from microsoft.public.word.application.errors on the
suggestion of another poster. Would have crossposted rather than
multiposted had I seen this NG originally.
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[Phillip Jones, C.E.T.]

Taz,

Its been so long since I've had a word Crash.

Does when a crash occurs, does the File show up in the Trash like it use
to?

I can remember if word or excel crashed and you restarted the file
would show up in the trash with some code name.

 

[Neo Geshel]

After having visited my client, and found nothing wrong, she has now
reported an additional problem.

When having two files open, and trying to save the new one to the hard
drive, she receives the following error message:

“
The disk is full, trying to write to Macintosh HD. Free some space on
this drive, or save the document on another disk. Try one or more of the
following:
1 close any unneeded documents, programs and windows.
2 save the document on another disk.
â€

The problem is, her hard drive is 500Gb in size and she's only making
use of around 80Gb of it!! In other words, W-T-F?!?!?! Logically she
should not be receiving this error message at all.

She clicked OK on that error window, and got another message:

“
Word is unable to save the auto-recover file in the location you have
specified. Make sure you have specified a valid location for
auto-recover files in preferences, and that you have permission to write
files to the location you specified.
â€

I also checked that location when I was there, and didn't find any
problems with the auto-recover location.

Since I am no-where near her computer, I must try to debug this at a
distance. Does anyone have any clue at all as to what might be going
wrong? In my visit, the normal.dot was deleted and rebuilt, all
permissions were rebuilt (and none that had problems were associated
with Office at all!) and the drive itself was verified to be in great
condition. Office is up to date, with the latest patches, and everything
else appears to be functioning just fine.

TIA,
...Geshel
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[CyberTaz]

Two diagnostic steps to help narrow down the possibilities:

1- Have the user log out then log in while holding the Shift key,

2- Have the user log in normally & run Word in a new/different User Account

Reply with the result of each. Also, were all the steps you've taken done
while logged in as an Administrator?

You're right about that first message - it's usually misleading but actually
indicating that the OS is refusing to write the file regardless of how much
space is available. It's a throwback message to the days of the Classic OS.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[John McGhie]

Tell the user to first ensure that ALL the updates for Mac OS X and for
Microsoft Office are applied to her computer.

That's your starting point. Until she's fully up-to-date, all bets are off.

After applying all the updates, it sometimes helps to use the Mac OS X Disk
Utility to "Repair Disk Permissions".

Then reboot the computer!

The "Disk Full" error is very non-specific. It means that Word was unable
to write to or delete one of about 25 files it has open while working on the
document. That, in turn, often indicates problems with the folder
permissioning within the user login.

Hope this helps

After having visited my client, and found nothing wrong, she has now
reported an additional problem.

When having two files open, and trying to save the new one to the hard
drive, she receives the following error message:

³
The disk is full, trying to write to Macintosh HD. Free some space on
this drive, or save the document on another disk. Try one or more of the
following:
1 close any unneeded documents, programs and windows.
2 save the document on another disk.
²

The problem is, her hard drive is 500Gb in size and she's only making
use of around 80Gb of it!! In other words, W-T-F?!?!?! Logically she
should not be receiving this error message at all.

She clicked OK on that error window, and got another message:

³
Word is unable to save the auto-recover file in the location you have
specified. Make sure you have specified a valid location for
auto-recover files in preferences, and that you have permission to write
files to the location you specified.
²

I also checked that location when I was there, and didn't find any
problems with the auto-recover location.

Since I am no-where near her computer, I must try to debug this at a
distance. Does anyone have any clue at all as to what might be going
wrong? In my visit, the normal.dot was deleted and rebuilt, all
permissions were rebuilt (and none that had problems were associated
with Office at all!) and the drive itself was verified to be in great
condition. Office is up to date, with the latest patches, and everything
else appears to be functioning just fine.

TIA,
...Geshel

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Neo Geshel]

Two diagnostic steps to help narrow down the possibilities:

1- Have the user log out then log in while holding the Shift key,

2- Have the user log in normally & run Word in a new/different User Account

Reply with the result of each. Also, were all the steps you've taken done
while logged in as an Administrator?

You're right about that first message - it's usually misleading but actually
indicating that the OS is refusing to write the file regardless of how much
space is available. It's a throwback message to the days of the ClassicOS.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

My client will be going on vacation soon, but I will try to get them to
do these actions before they actually leave town. Thank you.

There also is no second account on the system (there is just the one
user account).

Thanks for your help, will post the results here.

Cheers,
…Geshel
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[Neo Geshel]

Tell the user to first ensure that ALL the updates for Mac OS X and for
Microsoft Office are applied to her computer.

That's your starting point. Until she's fully up-to-date, all bets areoff.

After applying all the updates, it sometimes helps to use the Mac OS X Disk
Utility to "Repair Disk Permissions".

Then reboot the computer!

Done, done and done; and all mentioned in the previous post (had you
chosen to read it).

The "Disk Full" error is very non-specific. It means that Word was unable
to write to or delete one of about 25 files it has open while working on the
document. That, in turn, often indicates problems with the folder
permissioning within the user login.

Permissioning did not indicate any problems, as a full Repair
Permissions (once again, as mentioned in my previous post) brought up
nothing from within the Office 2008 folder or anything related to it.

…Geshel
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[Clive Huggan]

Done, done and done; and all mentioned in the previous post (had you
chosen to read it).

One of the great rewards of people such as John McGhie who voluntarily give
their expertise to fellow Office-sufferers is to chuckle over snide comments
like this!

Permissioning did not indicate any problems, as a full Repair
Permissions (once again, as mentioned in my previous post)

Ooh, and there you go again.

I don't know why John bothers.

Clive Huggan
============

 

[Neo Geshel]

One of the great rewards of people such as John McGhie who voluntarily give
their expertise to fellow Office-sufferers is to chuckle over snide comments
like this!

Ooh, and there you go again.

I don't know why John bothers.

Clive Huggan
============

My apologies if my post was offencive to you, but I am one of those
people who actually RTFM. Or, in other words, I actually take time to
read what was originally posted, rather than "shooting first and asking
questions later". Unfortunately, this also means I have limited patience
for those who are diametrically opposite.

Virtually every point he made I had already covered, handled and
dismissed in the very post he was responding to. I may be responsible
for the reply to his post, but I can't be held responsible for his
failure to read the original post in the first place.

...Geshel
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[John McGhie]

No-one is holding you responsible for my behaviour. Only your own.

I read your post, which raised a question in my mind about the sequence in
which you performed various operations.

I contribute here as a hobby, because some folks are nice and take the
trouble to say thanks for the effort, which makes me feel good.

If you wish to be one of the other kinds of folks, well, I'll just leave
your posts for someone else.

If you want a 'professional' level of service, then you will find my
business contact address in the .sig. Send me a firm order for $500.00 and
that will buy you four hours of my time, and you can be as rude as you like.

Cheers

My apologies if my post was offencive to you, but I am one of those
people who actually RTFM. Or, in other words, I actually take time to
read what was originally posted, rather than "shooting first and asking
questions later". Unfortunately, this also means I have limited patience
for those who are diametrically opposite.

Virtually every point he made I had already covered, handled and
dismissed in the very post he was responding to. I may be responsible
for the reply to his post, but I can't be held responsible for his
failure to read the original post in the first place.

...Geshel

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[Dan_E]

I'm having similar problems when editing either doc. or docx. files and then trying to save the file with the new edits. I experience a sudden crash of MS Word. I'm also having problems opening old doc files.

I have the latest updates to the OSX system and MS word. I have run disk utilities; ran repair disk permissions; and, I still have the same problems of trying to save the most recent edits for both doc and docx files. I have closed all programs and even after the disc repair, I have rebooted my computer

I have logged out and then log-in while holding the shift key.

Nothing seems to work. Please help

Oracle69

 

[CyberTaz]

Creating a new account through Apple Menu> System Preferences is simple &
painless. It helps to isolate the cause of such problems as either global or
account specific.

--
Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
Office:Mac MVP

Two diagnostic steps to help narrow down the possibilities:

1- Have the user log out then log in while holding the Shift key,

2- Have the user log in normally & run Word in a new/different User
Account

Reply with the result of each. Also, were all the steps you've taken done
while logged in as an Administrator?

You're right about that first message - it's usually misleading but
actually
indicating that the OS is refusing to write the file regardless of how
much
space is available. It's a throwback message to the days of the Classic
OS.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones [MVP] Office:Mac

My client will be going on vacation soon, but I will try to get them to
do these actions before they actually leave town. Thank you.

There also is no second account on the system (there is just the one
user account).

Thanks for your help, will post the results here.

Cheers,
…Geshel
--
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Do not send e-mail there unless you wish to be reported as a spammer.
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[CyberTaz]

Yours is actually a different situation even though the symptoms may sound
similar. The cause is most likely one or both:

Corrupt document, or
A corrupt Normal.dotm (I'm assuming you're using Office 2008?)

You'll find information of both issues in the Troubleshooting suggestions on
this page related to the topic: "Unexpected quit while in use". I'd try
testing Normal.dotm first.

 

[Neo Geshel]

No-one is holding you responsible for my behaviour. Only your own.

I read your post, which raised a question in my mind about the sequencein
which you performed various operations.

I contribute here as a hobby, because some folks are nice and take the
trouble to say thanks for the effort, which makes me feel good.

If you wish to be one of the other kinds of folks, well, I'll just leave
your posts for someone else.

If you want a 'professional' level of service, then you will find my
business contact address in the .sig. Send me a firm order for $500.00and
that will buy you four hours of my time, and you can be as rude as you like.

Cheers

Sorry, but I'm just your average, everyday hardworking middle-class
person. I don't work for the government, I'm not in healthcare or the
legal system and I'm not associated with any of the big multinational
companies. Ergo, I cannot afford those rates. My apologies, but no
silver spoon here.

There are a few Apple Authorized Service Providers around here, though,
that charge half as much for twice that amount of time. Only thing is my
client lives in the boonies, and needs the computer every day. Can't
just drag it into town for every small bug.

Cheers,
...Geshel

(BTW, why are you top-posting? Are you stuck with some Windows program,
like Outlook Express? I thought all normal Usenet programs
bottom-posted, as per proper Usenet specs and 25+ years of established
netiquette.)
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[John McGhie]

Hi Geshel:

There are a few Apple Authorized Service Providers around here, though,
that charge half as much for twice that amount of time.

Yep It's a marketplace ‹ as everywhere else, you get what you pay for

(BTW, why are you top-posting? Are you stuck with some Windows program,
like Outlook Express? I thought all normal Usenet programs
bottom-posted, as per proper Usenet specs and 25+ years of established
netiquette.)

Faster. Like most of us, I rarely have more than four hours of "hobby time"
in a day, usually only half that much. However, the groups I cover can
carry as many as 300 new posts per day.

If the newest information is at the top where I can see it in the first
screenful without scrolling, it means I can provide a lot more coverage in
the time I can afford for doing this.

Obviously, I would prefer that you top-posted too, because that makes my job
faster and easier. But if you prefer not to, no problem. Just excuse me if
I leave such posts until I have more time, when we get busy.

Cheers

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP, Word and Word:Mac
Sydney, Australia. mailto:[email protected]