X-XP compatibility issues

[mickael]

Dear NG,
I've experienced strange behaviors in exchanging X(mac 10.0.4) and XP
versions of PPt files

Here's the first story on XP: text blocks revert to oversized text in
XP
after resizing and saving a file. here's the workflow: create master
in OS
X and insert different masters from windows files (unknown version).
the show works fine. Send the file to an XP user who inserts more
different windows files in the master presentation. some text blocks
turn to over-sizes when pasted in the master and when corrected and
saved, problems reappears on reopening the file, ... I have no clue
does
anyone ?

Here's the second story on X (different files and machines than story
1):
bullets revert to any character after being changed.
Here's the workflow: Received a bunch of XP files. rework them in X
and
compile 3 different masters and files in a single file on reopening
the
file the bullet have been been changed to monotype or wingdings
characters, the file keeps reverting to that no matter what. Tried
opening the file in office 2001 same problem there. Also after
replacing
a fonts from the replace fonts dialog the replaced font name is still
in
the list. no matter what. again I have no clue.

Third story : I received this XP file i can't open in Office X on mac,
it give's a corrupted file or unknown format message. workaround
opening in Office XP on w2k machine and resaving for downward
compatibility (from 10 mb to 74mb now) then resaving from office 2000
to reach a reasonable 14 megs. back in office X(10.0.4) on the mac
(10.2.8) the file now opens and behaves fine until i save: it starts
saving then unexpectedly quits. Workaround: editing in MacOS 9 in
office 2001 where everything behaves normal. I handle zillions of ppt
file and it's the only one that does that and again it's an XP file.
It bahaves fine in ppt 2001 and the client is very happy with it in XP
and NT4. i just can't touch in office X any ideas anyone ?


thanks if you can help

-m

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi Mickael,

There are lots of different things going on with your workflow. Let's start
with this article:
Present with PowerPoint on any platform
<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/products/powerpointx/using.aspx?pid=usingpower
pointx&type=tips&article=/mac/LIBRARY/tips_tricks/officex/pp_crossplatformti
p.xml>

Pay special attention to the font issues mentioned. In particular, Windows
users are likely to have UniCode fonts that may not work right with Office
X.

Have you updated your copy of PowerPoint? Finder's Get Info command should
show it as 10.1.5 (030814). If not, then download and install the updates.
http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx

Also, be sure to use Disk Utility First Aid to repair permissions on your
drive after installing the updates.

Once you have updated everything then maybe me and others reading the NG can
do more for you to see what is happening between the versions.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

All responses should be made to this newsgroup within the same thread.
Thanks.

About Microsoft MVPs:
http://www.mvps.org/

Search for help with the free Google search Excel add-in:
<http://www.rondebruin.nl/Google.htm>

----------

 

[mickael]

Hi Jim,

thanks for your tips on repairing permissions, I'll make sure all
versions are "repaired", I've been tracking the problem further since
my last post : all ppt-x versions are running in either 10.1.4 or
10.1.5 on Jaguar 10.2.8 (Panther has more issues) and one is on a
newly installed Jaguar system with photoshop 7 and Office X 10.1.5
installed only. Fast save and Auto-fit text to text placeholder are
disabled in the preferences.

The observations remain :
1) Font sizes of Master text blocks (Title or Body at least) are
modified/reverted on reopening some files in XP from X and in X from
XP , the problem occurs on both platforms.
2) Fonts conversion to Unicode in XP seems involved.
3) Alternatively: "Keep multiple designs" option in X seems involved
too.
4) At least one PPT-XP file won't save in PPT-X (crash application),
the same file is safe in PPT 2001-OS9 and in PPT 2000-XP versions,.
5) Unicode generated in Non-XP versions works fine in X or 2001.
6) The computer operator and/or systems is not faulty.
7) The occurence seems random (on first or tenth reopening)

I strongly suspect some on XP setting/behaviour to bring corruption in
X and reversely.

My questions:
1) how do you track a Unicode font in a XP file ?
2) how can I enable Unicode in Jaguar ?
3) how do you stop XP front inserting Unicode ?
4) where can I learn more on Unicode ?
5) Has anyone XPerienced anything similar ?

thanks if you can help,

-mickael

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

My questions:
1) how do you track a Unicode font in a XP file ?

At least some of the common ones have Unicode in the font name. Arial
Unicode, for example.
Choose Format, Replace Fonts to see what fonts are used in a presentation
(in the upper listbox) on either PC or Mac PPT versions.

2) how can I enable Unicode in Jaguar ?
3) how do you stop XP front inserting Unicode ?

I doubt that you can, other than by uninstalling any unicod/doublebyte fonts
on the system.

4) where can I learn more on Unicode ?

Unicode from an MS perspective
http://search.microsoft.com
and search on "unicode"

or start at

http://www.microsoft.com/typography/

then click "Developing fonts", and explore the links re character sets.

Then the obvious: google "unicode"
The first hit is to www.unicode.org

\

 

[mickael]

Here are 2 more bugs tracked for your sagacity:

prepared a very brushed (clean) file in X with graphs, pics and
hyperlinks in slides, translated it to 3 languages for 3 versions of
the same slide show, then sent them to my XP client and :

1. all of a sudden after he edited the graphs (in all 3 versions) 1 of
them turns out a red cross in slideshow, you can still edit it but it
displays a cross when you leave the editor and this in 1 file only of
the 3 versions.

2. that same file won't display animations properly: a simple
auto-wipe right by paragraph on some very simple text slides, random
parts of the text won't animate ( 1 or 2 words at the end of a
paragraph appear before the animation starts) the only way is to trash
the anime and reapply it in XP. The weird part is that it displays and
animates fine in office 2000 ...

Is office XP bugware?