Sorcerer's Apprentice Revisited

G

GoFlatty

I have just begun working with my newly installed Office Professional.
Whenever I open an existing folder I often find a sea of TMP files;
perhaps up to a hundred. Sometimes I open a folder to find none. But
if I open an existing word document and then close it, a rash of new
temp files appears. I have tried deleting them only to have them
reappear next time I open the file. This doesn't happen with a newly
created Word document. Being a writer I have many lengthy and complex
Word files from my earlier 2003 Office program.

Help!

I'm drowning......
GoFlatty (Geelong, Australia)
 
H

Herb Tyson [MVP]

Word creates tmp files when you edit a document. It's supposed to delete
them when you save & close the file. If Word crashes, or is otherwise closed
unceremoniously however, normal housekeeping doesn't occur, and there are
leftover .tmp files. In my experience, earlier versions of Word used to
create a lot more tmp files than later versions do.

In the "olden days", I frequently did a search for files matching ~*.tmp
(with Word not running), and deleted them all. This was essential because
earlier versions of Word weren't careful about .tmp files, and would latch
onto existing .tmp files as if they were part of a new editing session. This
produced many corrupted documents and hung Word sessions.

If I were you... I would close Word, search & destroy files matching ~*.tmp,
then start keeping an eye on matters to see if Word is still creating lots
of new .tmp files when editing older documents. Also, make sure that Fast
Saves is not enabled (Tools - Options - Save - Allow fast saves). That
document-corrupting feature often creates additional .tmp files to keep
track of the different parts of a gerrymandered document... the larger the
document, the more likely that the Fast Save feature will corrupt it. (The
Fast Save feature, thankfully, was finally retired in Word 2007.)
 
G

GoFlatty

Word creates tmp files when you edit a document. It's supposed to delete
them when you save & close the file. If Word crashes, or is otherwise closed
unceremoniously however, normal housekeeping doesn't occur, and there are
leftover .tmp files. In my experience, earlier versions of Word used to
create a lot more tmp files than later versions do.

In the "olden days", I frequently did a search for files matching ~*.tmp
(with Word not running), and deleted them all. This was essential because
earlier versions of Word weren't careful about .tmp files, and would latch
onto existing .tmp files as if they were part of a new editing session. This
produced many corrupted documents and hung Word sessions.

If I were you... I would close Word, search & destroy files matching ~*.tmp,
then start keeping an eye on matters to see if Word is still creating lots
of new .tmp files when editing older documents. Also, make sure that Fast
Saves is not enabled (Tools - Options - Save - Allow fast saves). That
document-corrupting feature often creates additional .tmp files to keep
track of the different parts of a gerrymandered document... the larger the
document, the more likely that the Fast Save feature will corrupt it. (The
Fast Save feature, thankfully, was finally retired in Word 2007.)

--
Herb Tyson MS MVP
Author of the Word 2007 Bible
Blog:http://word2007bible.herbtyson.com
Web:http://www.herbtyson.com






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G'day, Herb!
Thanks for your advice. I will do as you suggest and see how it all
goes.
Much appreciated.
Cheers!
GoFlatty (Australia)
 
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