Reveal formatting won't turn off

C

Cindy

Hello --

In Word XP, the formatting codes will not go away. Every
new document shows the codes. I have to go to
Format/Reveal Formatting and uncheck the "Show all
formatting marks" box every time. When I close that
document and open a new one the "Show all formatting
marks" box is checked again! And all the checkboxes
under the Formatting Marks section of Tools/Options/View
are cleared! I tried uninstalling and then reinstalling
Office but same thing. I even tried reinstalling Windows
XP. Why is Word insisting on showing the formatting
marks?

Thanks so much for any help you can give me -- Cindy
 
B

Beth Melton

Hi Cindy,

Try the following:

- Exit Outlook if you are using Word as your email editor
- Start Word
- Create a new document if necessary
- Make sure the new document is the only document open
- Turn off the Nonprinting Characters (formatting marks)
- Exit Word
- Restart Word

If the above steps work then the problem lies in how Word saves your
personal preferences. It will use the setting for document window open
prior to exiting Word. If you encounter problems in the future just
make sure you only have one document window open when modifying your
settings.

--
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
C

Cindy

Beth --

Thanks so much for replying to my post!

I did what you said but nothing changed. When I create a
new document in Word the formatting marks are turned off
but as soon as I start typing they turn on
automatically. I turned them off and exited Word. When
I went back into Word, the same thing happened as
before. Really weird.
 
B

Beth Melton

Hi Cindy,

If your settings are not being saved then I first suspect a global
template/add-in is modifying your preferences.

To determine if you are using any global templates go to
Tools/Templates and Add-Ins and see if there are any global templates
or add-ins listed. If so they are located in one of your Startup
folders. The location of the Word\Startup folder can be found under
Tools/Options/File Locations and the Office\Startup folder can be
found in the Office installation path..

Take a look in each folder and if you find more than one file move
them one at a time and try duplicating the error after each file is
moved out of the folder until you determine which one is causing the
problem.

--
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
C

Cindy

I looked under Tools/Templates and Add-Ins. There was
only Normal in the first box under Document Template.
 
B

Beth Melton

Macros perhaps?

Take a look under Tools/Macro/Macro and see if there are any macros
beginning with "Auto" or any you didn't create in the list.

--
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
C

Cindy

There's nothing on the list under Tools/Macro/Macro.
It's blank. Is it possible that another program is
interferring with Word? I have 18 computers all running
the same thing (or supposed to be) and only this one PC
is giving me fits. Could this particular PC have some
software conflict that is causing the formatting to
always be on in Word?
 
B

Beth Melton

Hi Cindy,

First try starting Word using the /a switch to see if the nonprinting
characters display. Go to Start/Run and run:

winword /a

Note the space before the forward slash.

This will start Word using the defaults which will by-pass your
Normal.dot, global templates/add-ins, and preferences stored in the
Registry. Let us know what you find and we'll go from there. :)

--
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP

Word FAQ: http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine: http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site: http://mvps.org/
 
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