Custom Dictionary

[srl]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel

I have searched forum posts for the last year or so (since Word 2008 was mentioned); I've tried everything suggested and nothing has worked for me.
When I try to spell check a document, I get a warning:

The custom dictionary "Custom Dictionary" is not available. If I click OK, I can still spell check the document but the Add button is greyed out, so I can't add to the dictionary.

I've opened the Custom Dictionary file in Finder and it appears to be ok. As many suggested in older posts, making a small change and exiting the file does not help; I still get the same warning.

Dragging the Custom Dictionary icon from Finder to the Word icon in the Dock to open the file doesn't help.

Preferences are set correctly, unless there is something weird to set that I don't know about. Next to Custom Dictionary, Custom Dictionary is chosen. Clicking Dictionaries, Custom Dictionary is chosen and appears.

Does anyone know why I am getting this error and how to fix this?

Thanks very much.

 

[John McGhie]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel

I have searched forum posts for the last year or so (since Word 2008 was
mentioned); I've tried everything suggested and nothing has worked for me.
When I try to spell check a document, I get a warning:

The custom dictionary "Custom Dictionary" is not available. If I click OK, I
can still spell check the document but the Add button is greyed out, so I
can't add to the dictionary.

I've opened the Custom Dictionary file in Finder and it appears to be ok. As
many suggested in older posts, making a small change and exiting the file does
not help; I still get the same warning.

Dragging the Custom Dictionary icon from Finder to the Word icon in the Dock
to open the file doesn't help.

Preferences are set correctly, unless there is something weird to set that I
don't know about. Next to Custom Dictionary, Custom Dictionary is chosen.
Clicking Dictionaries, Custom Dictionary is chosen and appears.

Does anyone know why I am getting this error and how to fix this?

Thanks very much.

We're tracking a new bug where the content of the custom dictionary seems to
be being converted to the wrong version of Unicode. This would potentially
produce the problem you are reporting.

To resolve it, create a new, blank custom dictionary, then edit the new one
and paste the entries from the old one into it. Make sure you do not assign
a "Language" to the new dictionary: it should be set to "No Language".

When you paste, make sure you use Edit>Paste Special>Unformatted Text to
ensure that you do not bring across any formatting that would cause Word to
express the dictionary in a different character set.

Delete or remove the old dictionary.

That should resolve the issue. If it does, please tell us.

Hope this helps


This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[srl]

This worked beautifully! Thank you so much for the solution.

Sheri

 

[TheBlueHombre]

I had the same problem and the solution worked beautifully. Hopefully this can get corrected in a future update.

 

[John McGhie]

I had the same problem and the solution worked beautifully. Hopefully this can
get corrected in a future update.

Thanks. Yeah, I hope so.

I have logged it as a bug. Unfortunately, they are unlikely to work on any
bugs in Office 2008 at this stage, all effort is on Office 2010.

So unless they have reason to open that area of the code to do something
else, we're likely to have to live with it.

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[wpaulin]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)
Processor: Intel

I have searched forum posts for the last year or so (since Word 2008 was
mentioned); I've tried everything suggested and nothing has worked for me.
When I try to spell check a document, I get a warning:

The custom dictionary "Custom Dictionary" is not available. If I click OK, I
can still spell check the document but the Add button is greyed out, so I
can't add to the dictionary.

I've opened the Custom Dictionary file in Finder and it appears to be ok. As
many suggested in older posts, making a small change and exiting the file does
not help; I still get the same warning.

Dragging the Custom Dictionary icon from Finder to the Word icon in the Dock
to open the file doesn't help.

Preferences are set correctly, unless there is something weird to set that I
don't know about. Next to Custom Dictionary, Custom Dictionary is chosen.
Clicking Dictionaries, Custom Dictionary is chosen and appears.

Does anyone know why I am getting this error and how to fix this?

Thanks very much.

We're tracking a new bug where the content of the custom dictionary seems to
be being converted to the wrong version of Unicode. This would potentially
produce the problem you are reporting.

To resolve it, create a new, blank custom dictionary, then edit the new one
and paste the entries from the old one into it. Make sure you do not assign
a "Language" to the new dictionary: it should be set to "No Language".

When you paste, make sure you use Edit>Paste Special>Unformatted Text to
ensure that you do not bring across any formatting that would cause Word to
express the dictionary in a different character set.

Delete or remove the old dictionary.

That should resolve the issue. If it does, please tell us.

Hope this helps


This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]
[/QUOTE]
I have had this problem since January 2008 when I installed Office 2008 in a brand new Mac Book. JANUARY 2009 ... the Microsoft folks never told me about this site (the Mac folks just did).

Apple folks and Microsoft folks have worked long hours to fix this permanently. Reload Operating system, reload Office many times. Mac even replaced my machine with a new machine.

Since June, with Apple Store's help, the problem was avoided , except for one flare up in AUgust. But now it is back full time.

I tried your solution here, and it worked great until the dictionary got up to 43 entries (from spell checking and hitting "add word").

I'll try it again with a third dictionary.

But I am astonished that Microsoft would not fix something as important as this ... and that their call in folks at both levels don't know about this?!?!?

Bill

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

But I am astonished that Microsoft would not fix something as important
as this ... and that their call in folks at both levels don't know about
this?!?!?

I won;t comment on the phone support folks :-> but I've a had pretty bad
experience with them in France (asking me to go to C: etc :-> ).

It's a fairly well known issue on the newsgroups. It has been around for
a while (since Office 2008 came out) and it looks like it's coming back
with a vengeance with now Leopard.

No idea what triggers the corruption, but it is indeed the root of many
custom dictionary issues.

Corentin

 

[John McGhie]

I have had this problem since January 2008 when I installed Office 2008 in a
brand new Mac Book. JANUARY 2009 ... the Microsoft folks never told me about
this site (the Mac folks just did).

Apple folks and Microsoft folks have worked long hours to fix this
permanently. Reload Operating system, reload Office many times. Mac even
replaced my machine with a new machine.

Since June, with Apple Store's help, the problem was avoided , except for one
flare up in AUgust. But now it is back full time.

I tried your solution here, and it worked great until the dictionary got up to
43 entries (from spell checking and hitting "add word").

I'll try it again with a third dictionary.

But I am astonished that Microsoft would not fix something as important as
this ... and that their call in folks at both levels don't know about
this?!?!?

Bill

Hi Bill:

They would love to fix it, but they can't FIND it

I had an email this morning from the software engineer who is looking for
it. The new "flavour" of the bug does not show up in English (US).

You have not given us any details about your version of Word or version of
operating system: without the version numbers and update levels, we simply
cannot help you.

But what you are describing sounds like you might be missing a service pack.

Cheers

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

--

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Vyvyan]

Hi folks,
I recently installed Snow Leopard on my MacBook Pro and cannot get the dictionary to function.

I've tried all the suggested fixes - added new dictionary, copied the old one, pasted as 'unformatted text', deleted old custom dictionary, even opened and deleted one character and save the dictionary, enabled it again - and still Word gives me an message when I open it, 'dictionary unavailable.'

I'm not finding any solution listed in the forum working (I've tried them all multiple times).

Any other ideas? I've had to switch to Mac Pages to complete my work. This is a bummer since I spent the money for Office.
* sigh*

Cheers!

 

[Diane Ross]

Any other ideas? I've had to switch to Mac Pages to complete my work. This is
a bummer since I spent the money for Office.
* sigh*

Testing in a new User will quickly tell you if the problem is system wide or
if it¹s your User¹s folder that contains the problem.

Go to System Preferences --> Create a New User in Accounts. Switch to the
New User by logging out/in or use Fast User Switching.

Open Word and try adding to the dictionary. Does it work in the new User? If
yes, then the problem is in your User's folder.

Troubleshooting Your User Account for a Problem

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/troubleshoot/test_user.html>

If the problem exists in the new User, then you need to look at the base
level. Install Snow Leopard over itself, make sure it's updated to 10.6.1
then re-install Office.

Steps to re-install Office

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/install/reinstall_steps.html>

You'll need to trash the duplicate fonts in the Library/Fonts/Microsoft
folder after the install. Snow Leopard replaced several fonts with newer
versions. Use Font Book in Applications to validate fonts. A yellow badge
will show the ones that are duplicates. Using these badges as a guide, open
the Library/Fonts/Microsoft folder and delete the fonts that are identified
with the yellow badge. It's also possible Font Book will identify other
fonts that could be suspicious.

Hope this helps!

 

[John McGhie]

Hi Vyvyan:

You left out the important bit, so we can't answer We need to know
which version of Word you are using, and what is the latest update you have
applied?

You should also check which language you have set the OS to. Word picks up
its default language from the OS when it starts: if the OS is in a language
Word does not have installed, you will get this problem.

I assume you have followed the instructions in the Word Help for
"activating" the custom dictionary?

Just to recap: this can be one of four things: The dictionary is in the
wrong character set, the dictionary is not activated, or the OS is on the
wrong language, or Service Pack 2 is missing.

Hope this helps

Hi folks,
I recently installed Snow Leopard on my MacBook Pro and cannot get the
dictionary to function.

I've tried all the suggested fixes - added new dictionary, copied the old one,
pasted as 'unformatted text', deleted old custom dictionary, even opened and
deleted one character and save the dictionary, enabled it again - and still
Word gives me an message when I open it, 'dictionary unavailable.'

I'm not finding any solution listed in the forum working (I've tried them all
multiple times).

Any other ideas? I've had to switch to Mac Pages to complete my work. This is
a bummer since I spent the money for Office.
* sigh*

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]

 

[Keith H]

This solution (create new, copy old entries and paste into new, delete old
dictionary) worked for me as well. Office 2008 for Mac with the very latest
(as of 10/23/09) update on Snow Leopard.

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

This solution (create new, copy old entries and paste into new, delete old
dictionary) worked for me as well. Office 2008 for Mac with the very latest
(as of 10/23/09) update on Snow Leopard.

FYI, most of the time, making a small modification to the file (eg: add
a space and remove it) and saving straight from Word does the trick too.
The idea is to force Word to resave the file (which doesn't happen if
you simply open and hit Save since you haven't made any modification).

This fixes the nasty encoding issues that plague the custom
dictionaries.

Corentin

 

[Matthew Setter]

I agree, creating a new custom dictionary worked for me also. Now it is
working as expected.

To help out, if this bug is not yet resolved; This was a fresh install of
Mac Office 2008, no alterations, customisations or other changes.

much appreciated,

Matt

 

[John McGhie]

A corrupted custom dictionary on a "fresh install" is the OLD bug, not the
new one

The new one corrupts the Custom Dictionary during the conversion to Snow
Leopard and is more difficult to resolve. The old bug can be resolved by
editing and re-saving the Custom Dictionary.

Cheers

I agree, creating a new custom dictionary worked for me also. Now it is
working as expected.

To help out, if this bug is not yet resolved; This was a fresh install of
Mac Office 2008, no alterations, customisations or other changes.

much appreciated,

Matt

--

This email is my business email -- Please do not email me about forum
matters unless you intend to pay!

John McGhie, Microsoft MVP (Word, Mac Word), Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. | Ph: +61 (0)4 1209 1410
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]