Problems with languagew selections

[Ritter197]

Lately I notice that the spelling selection, after I make the selection for
a different language and say OK, it does not keep the selected language but
goes back to English. It was not always like that, but I noticed it
yesterday and to-day.

This is with MSWord 2003 and WindowsXP, SP #2 .

Why would that be and how do I fix this?

 

[Edward O'Brien]

Hi,

Word detects these languages automatically but they are not available, then
they must be installed from the CD.
a.. Arabic
b.. Chinese (Simplified)
c.. Chinese (Traditional)
d.. Danish
e.. Dutch
f.. English
g.. Finnish
h.. French
i.. German
j.. Greek
k.. Hebrew
l.. Italian
m.. Japanese
n.. Korean
o.. Norwegian
p.. Polish
q.. Portuguese
r.. Russian
s.. Spanish
t.. Swedish
u.. Thai

To automatically detect a language go to "Tools//Language//Set Language".
Enable "Detect language automatically".

To enable certain languages you can get all the information here:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/assistance/HA011306731033.aspx

Good luck,

Ed

 

[Ritter197]

Ed, I had previously already set to "automatically" detect the language, in
this case German. But in spite of this, the symptons described creep up.

 

[Edward O'Brien]

If selected, German should have a blue tick against it in the "Set Language"
dialogue box. When setting this language, did you select the text?


Ed

 

[anon k]

Ed, I had previously already set to "automatically" detect the language, in
this case German. But in spite of this, the symptons described creep up.

Don't trust Word to automatically detect the languages correctly. It
gets them wrong so often (and, in my case, can't spot English) that it
is much less troublesome to set languages manually.

 

[Ritter197]

I do see the blue tick but nowhere where it says TEXT.

 

[Edward O'Brien]

Hi.

If you are using Word 2000+, you can change the default setting for language
by going to Microsoft Office Tools and selecting "Microsoft Office Language
Settings". This changes quite a lot but if you haven't done too much by way
of customizing, it should not be a problem. It does apply to all of Office,
however.

May I suggest going to "Help" in MS Word. There is so much to relate it is
impossible to do so here.

Another good place is: "How to check spelling and grammar in another
language in Word 2003"
http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/assistance/HA011305121033.aspx

A little different to the last one I sent you...

Best wishes,

Ed

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Ritter197,

Lately I notice that the spelling selection, after I make the selection for
a different language and say OK, it does not keep the selected language but
goes back to English. It was not always like that, but I noticed it
yesterday and to-day.

This is with MSWord 2003 and WindowsXP, SP #2 .

In the Tips section of my website is an article that describes how Word does
its language formatting, and what you can do to get some control. Work
through that and see if things become more predictable...

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 8 2004)
http://www.word.mvps.org

This reply is posted in the Newsgroup; please post any follow question or
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[Ritter197]

Thanks for trying to help.

The problem is that after selection German it just jumps back each time (or
80 % of the time to English. That is most annoying and nothing seems to
work.

I did not have that problem with MSOffice 97 or 2000, but now with MSOffice
2003. Therefore, it also cannot be the OS, since I had Windows XP with
MSOffice 97, then MSOffice 2000 and now 2003.

But it drives me batty.

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Ritter197,

The problem is that after selection German it just jumps back each time (or
80 % of the time to English. That is most annoying and nothing seems to
work.

OK. But did you read the article, right down to the bitter end?

The problem is most likely that the document(s) was created on a system with
"mixed language" default settings. So the Windows default has become embedded
into the document and keeps cropping up.

First, make sure your Windows and Word default languages match.

Then, if you do Ctrl+A, then select German as the language, how stable is the
document? Does it switch back to English anywhere you work? Or only in certain
places (like the end of the document, or in a text box, or...)?

I did not have that problem with MSOffice 97 or 2000, but now with MSOffice
2003. Therefore, it also cannot be the OS, since I had Windows XP with
MSOffice 97, then MSOffice 2000 and now 2003.

But it drives me batty.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 8 2004)
http://www.word.mvps.org

This reply is posted in the Newsgroup; please post any follow question or
reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail

 

[Ritter197]

Hi Ritter197,

OK. But did you read the article, right down to the bitter end?

YES, I did read it to the bitter end.

The problem is most likely that the document(s) was created on a system
with
"mixed language" default settings. So the Windows default has become
embedded
into the document and keeps cropping up.

First, make sure your Windows and Word default languages match.

I did.

Then, if you do Ctrl+A, then select German as the language, how stable is
the
document? Does it switch back to English anywhere you work? Or only in
certain
places (like the end of the document, or in a text box, or...)?

When I do the Ctl plus A and select the language then, it does say after
selection that it cannot find the German dictionary, but then continues
checking it anyhow. I have tried it this way about 4 times now and the
spellchecker did NOT jump back to English. Strange, one has to go through
all this. Not very intuitive or user-friendly and too many "things" to do
before it spellchecks in German.

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Ritter197,

When I do the Ctl plus A and select the language then, it does say after
selection that it cannot find the German dictionary, but then continues
checking it anyhow. I have tried it this way about 4 times now and the
spellchecker did NOT jump back to English. Strange, one has to go through
all this. Not very intuitive or user-friendly and too many "things" to do
before it spellchecks in German.

No argument with you, here. "We've" complained about the Windows language
overriding languages in Word since the behavior was introduced in Word97.
Those at the other end just don't seem to be able to comprehend the problem
<sigh>

OK, is this just the one document, or are you having this problem with all
new documents, as well?

For this particular document, if it continues misbehaving, we could save it
as XML, open it as a pure text file, then search for the English formatting
code and remove it. But if it seems stable now, it should remain so unless
your Windows language changes again, or you insert a text box (that will
probably revert to English).

If you're seeing the problem in NEW documents, then likely your Normal.dot
has been affected. In that case, after making sure my languages are
synchronized, I'd rename it to NormalOLD.dot, then start up Word and let it
create a clean copy.

Not much you can do about documents you're receiving from another source,
however, except to educate the people at the other end on how to set up
their systems. You could also record a macro that does the Ctrl+A, select
language steps for you so that it goes faster.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 8 2004)
http://www.word.mvps.org

This reply is posted in the Newsgroup; please post any follow question or
reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail