Custom dictionary does not become available

[lindsay]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Power PC

I have recently migrated from MSW2004 to MSW2008. In the upgrade process, my existing custom dictionary has been transferred into the User>Library>Preferences>Microsoft>Office 2008 folder.
However, it does not appear in the "custom dictionary" selector bar in the preferences pane.
If I click on the Dictionaries button there, I find the dictionary referred to in the selection box. If I select the checkbox and click OK - nothing happens; the selector bar is still empty.
If, while in the dictionaries selection panel, I click "Edit", I can successfully open (and presumably edit) the custom dictionary.
If, while in the dictionaries selection panel, I click "new", I can create a new dictionary, which appears selected in the list; but when I close the panel it does not appear in the selector bar. Every time I reopen the dictionaries selection panel, all boxes are unchecked.
I have made sure that the language is set to "none" in line with suggestions in this forum (but not in the help files).

How do I get a functioning custom dictionary in Word 2008?

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Lindsay:

These things can be very irritating to track down.

Either your custom dictionary, or your preferences, are corrupt. That means
the changes you make are not being saved, or are being ignored.

The first thing is to quit Word, then drag both old and new Custom
Dictionaries to your desktop.

This disconnects the old Custom Dictionary.

Now restart Word and create a New (blank) custom dictionary. This time,
name it something other than "Custom Dictionary" so that you can tell them
apart.

Quit Word, and re-start it again. See if the setting holds this time.

If not, quit all Office applications and use Disk Utility to Repair
Permissions on the boot drive. Try again.

If it's still bad, if the following files exist, Remove or rename them:

~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Word Settings (10)

~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Word Settings (11)

User/Library/Preferences/com.Microsoft.Word.plist

User/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008 (the whole folder!)

Try that, and see how you get on.

Cheers

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger)
Processor: Power PC

I have recently migrated from MSW2004 to MSW2008. In the upgrade process, my
existing custom dictionary has been transferred into the
User>Library>Preferences>Microsoft>Office 2008 folder.
However, it does not appear in the "custom dictionary" selector bar in the
preferences pane.
If I click on the Dictionaries button there, I find the dictionary referred to
in the selection box. If I select the checkbox and click OK - nothing happens;
the selector bar is still empty.
If, while in the dictionaries selection panel, I click "Edit", I can
successfully open (and presumably edit) the custom dictionary.
If, while in the dictionaries selection panel, I click "new", I can create a
new dictionary, which appears selected in the list; but when I close the panel
it does not appear in the selector bar. Every time I reopen the dictionaries
selection panel, all boxes are unchecked.
I have made sure that the language is set to "none" in line with suggestions
in this forum (but not in the help files).

How do I get a functioning custom dictionary in Word 2008?

--

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
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[lindsay]

Thanks, John, but...see interleaved responses

Hi Lindsay:

These things can be very irritating to track down.

Either your custom dictionary, or your preferences, are corrupt. That means
the changes you make are not being saved, or are being ignored.

The first thing is to quit Word, then drag both old and new Custom
Dictionaries to your desktop.

This disconnects the old Custom Dictionary.

Now restart Word and create a New (blank) custom dictionary. This time,
name it something other than "Custom Dictionary" so that you can tell them
apart.

Quit Word, and re-start it again. See if the setting holds this time.

No, behaviour is identical. One intriguing point - when the dictionary selection box opens, the dictionaries moved to the desktop are still listed (with their original paths). The listings can be deleted using the box button, but the dictionaries cannot be edited, so presumably MSW can't actually find them.

If not, quit all Office applications and use Disk Utility to Repair
Permissions on the boot drive. Try again.

Didndid - no change in behaviour.

If it's still bad, if the following files exist, Remove or rename them:

~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Word Settings (10)

~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Word Settings (11)

These two did not exist on my HD

User/Library/Preferences/com.Microsoft.Word.plist

User/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008 (the whole folder!)

Try that, and see how you get on.

No change in behaviour of the dictionaries. Predictably, this final restart produced its own CD, with the checkbox checked - but the name did not appear in the selection bar in the preference pane.

One wrinkle that I mention in response to your recommendation to repair the startup disk; I run a "sandbox" system (courtesy SuperDuper); my main disk ("Rosinante"), containing all user files and most applications at any given time, is not the startup disk ("HAL"). The username folder inside HAL/Users is aliased to Rosinante/Users/username. All application updates are applied first to HAL, and subsequently if there are no problems reapplied to Rosinante, so that Rosinante is (in principle) always a stable platform.

Perhaps Word, running on HAL, needs to see its Custom Dictionary on the same physical disk for some arcane reason?

Now what??

Cordially,
Lindsay

 

[Ingrid]

Hi Ho, similar problems here, I get boxes telling me the custom dictionary is not available, in none of the languages I created one in. Worse, the application keeps quitting unexpectedly since I created custom dictionaries, causing me to lose unsaved changes because it often will quit again as soon as I touch a recovered document. Quitting occurs when I move the cursor from one document to another... I often need to work in three languages simultaneously. I just ran Disk Utilities, verified the Disk Permissions and it said "ACL not found". If this is part of the problem, then it's part of the solution?

Thanks, and hopefully there is a solution soon for this nerve wrecking problem...

 

[etcstgo]

Hi Ho, similar problems here, I get boxes telling me the custom dictionaryis not available, in none of the languages I created one in. Worse, the application keeps quitting unexpectedly since I created custom dictionaries, causing me to lose unsaved changes because it often will quit again as soon asI touch a recovered document. Quitting occurs when I move the cursor from one document to another... I often need to work in three languages simultaneously.

Ingrid,

Trying to spellcheck Spanish text or add words to a Spanish custom
dictionary will result in what you describe. Is Spanish involved in
the equation at all?

Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile

 

[Ingrid]

At the moment I am working with texts in Spanish too, indeed. The funny thing is I get the red lines all over in those, especially with words with accents. I have not added words in Spanish, save one time when I tried to add one and the app immediately quit from under my pointer... the other documents are Dutch and English. Unexpected quits happens on command-save, or while clicking in a window to bring it up front.

Is there a relation to the "ACL not found" in disk utilities?

BTW, I use OSX 10.5.2 dualcore powerbook.

 

[Ingrid]

I tried again leftmouse down adding and/or checking a word in Spanish and hooray! I got the beach ball and had to force quit.

 

[etcstgo]

I tried again leftmouse down adding and/or checking a word in Spanish and hooray! I got the beach ball and had to force quit.

Recommended reading:

http://tinyurl.com/486gex

No, that's a normal message you can safely ignore.

Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile

 

[etcstgo]

I tried again leftmouse down adding and/or checking a word in Spanish and hooray! I got the beach ball and had to force quit.

Recommended reading:

http://tinyurl.com/3gr9yo

No, that's a normal message you can safely ignore.

Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile

 

[Ingrid]

Wow, what a story. But on my 2008 version nothing fixed then?

 

[etcstgo]

Wow, what a story. But on my 2008 version nothing fixed then?

That's correct, the Spanish custom dictionary bug is back. It gets
reintroduced with every new version, like clockwork.

Patricio Mason
Santiago, Chile

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Lindsay:

Well, I do not have any further useful information to contribute! You have
done everything we recommend.

Yes, Office assumes that it is installed on the boot volume, and various
things do not work right it the OS, Office, and the User folders are not on
the same volume. It shouldn't matter, but for some things, it seems to.

And if you follow the Spanish discussion below, you will see that the
spelling/custom dictionary/keyboard mechanism has been a train-wreck for
multiple versions. It's no better in 2008!

Cheers

Thanks, John, but...see interleaved responses


No, behaviour is identical. One intriguing point - when the dictionary
selection box opens, the dictionaries moved to the desktop are still listed
(with their original paths). The listings can be deleted using the box button,
but the dictionaries cannot be edited, so presumably MSW can't actually find
them.


Didndid - no change in behaviour.


These two did not exist on my HD


No change in behaviour of the dictionaries. Predictably, this final restart
produced its own CD, with the checkbox checked - but the name did not appear
in the selection bar in the preference pane.

One wrinkle that I mention in response to your recommendation to repair the
startup disk; I run a "sandbox" system (courtesy SuperDuper); my main disk
("Rosinante"), containing all user files and most applications at any given
time, is not the startup disk ("HAL"). The username folder inside HAL/Users is
aliased to Rosinante/Users/username. All application updates are applied first
to HAL, and subsequently if there are no problems reapplied to Rosinante, so
that Rosinante is (in principle) always a stable platform.

Perhaps Word, running on HAL, needs to see its Custom Dictionary on the same
physical disk for some arcane reason?

Now what??

Cordially,
Lindsay

--

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
Nhulunbuy, NT, Australia. mailto:[email protected]

 

[lindsay]

Hello John,
I think my last conjecture hits the spot! MSW and the custom dictionary must be on the same drive. My instance of MSW runs on the startup drive "HAL", but all (my) user files are on drive "Rosinante"; my user directory on HAL is an alias.
Running MSW on Rosinante as startup drive produces no custom-dictionary problem.
I put a copy of my existing custom dictionary onto HAL (in HAL/Library/Preferences, outside my user folder), and added that to the MSW Preference dictionary list - and it sticks!

Thus my second-sentence conclusion. I will communicate this to Shirt Pocket Software, altho I think this feature is a Microsoft contribution.

Cordially,
LT

 

[John McGhie]

Thanks Lindsay:

Where as *I* shall submit it to Microsoft, because they need to fix this so
that it always works

Cheers

Hello John,
I think my last conjecture hits the spot! MSW and the custom dictionary must
be on the same drive. My instance of MSW runs on the startup drive "HAL", but
all (my) user files are on drive "Rosinante"; my user directory on HAL is an
alias.
Running MSW on Rosinante as startup drive produces no custom-dictionary
problem.
I put a copy of my existing custom dictionary onto HAL (in
HAL/Library/Preferences, outside my user folder), and added that to the MSW
Preference dictionary list - and it sticks!

Thus my second-sentence conclusion. I will communicate this to Shirt Pocket
Software, altho I think this feature is a Microsoft contribution.

Cordially,
LT

--
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]