Weird Word corruption.

[mikecassells]

Hi,

I have a user with a very strange Word problem.

For some reason some of her Word document icons have been changed to a
Unix exec icon and they will not open in Word X.

I've tried:

i) changing which application the file is associated with (to Word) -
no good, icon does not change to a Word icon,

ii) adding the .doc extension - icon changes to a Word icon but will
not open in Word and,

iii) using the open> recover all text option (sorry, I can't remember
exactly what it's called) in the Open dialog - won't open.
Any idea what's going on?

Thanks, Mike

 

[Beth Rosengard]

Hi Mike,

Try repairing disk permissions: Go to Macintosh HD/Applications/Utilities.
Open up Disk Utility. Select your hard disk, then click the First Aid tab.
Click the button to "Repair Disk Permissions".

--
***Please always reply to the newsgroup!***

Beth Rosengard
Mac MVP

Mac Word FAQ: <http://word.mvps.org/MacWordNew/index.htm>
Entourage Help Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org>

 

[mikecassells]

Thanks - unfortunately it didn't change anything.

Has anyone ever seen anything like this before?

This user can email a Windows user the corrupted files and the Windows
user can open them. What gives?

Mike

 

[matt neuburg]

I have a user with a very strange Word problem.

For some reason some of her Word document icons have been changed to a
Unix exec icon

This suggests that they have become executable. Easy to find out (and
fix). m.

 

[mikecassells]

ok .. how do you do that?

Mike

 

[Bill Weylock]

Before you try anything else, Mike, try adding extensions if they are
missing. That should convert them back into well-behaving files. I don¹t
know why it happens, but I¹ve run into something similar. I don¹t recall
it¹s happening with Word docs, but it may have. Certainly worth a try. Give
it the old .doc treatment.


Best,


- Bill

ok .. how do you do that?

Mike

Panther 10.3.6
Office 2004
Windows XP Pro SP2
Office 2003

 

[Paul Berkowitz]

Before you try anything else, Mike, try adding extensions if they are missing.
That should convert them back into well-behaving files. I don¹t know why it
happens, but I¹ve run into something similar. I don¹t recall it¹s happening
with Word docs, but it may have. Certainly worth a try. Give it the old .doc
treatment.

He said in his first message:

I've tried:

i) changing which application the file is associated with (to Word) -
no good, icon does not change to a Word icon,

ii) adding the .doc extension - icon changes to a Word icon but will
not open in Word and,

iii) using the open> recover all text option (sorry, I can't remember
exactly what it's called) in the Open dialog - won't open.
Any idea what's going on?

It's very nice that you want to help, Bill, but please read the whole thread
first.

Take Matt's suggestion, Look up a Mac OS X or Unix book on permissions; try
Mac OS X Hints website. You need to open Terminal and change permissions on
the file to remove the "x" for that file. Or use a user-friendly app like
BatChmod to do it.

--
Paul Berkowitz
MVP MacOffice
Entourage FAQ Page: <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/faq/index.html>
AppleScripts for Entourage: <http://macscripter.net/scriptbuilders/>

Please "Reply To Newsgroup" to reply to this message. Emails will be
ignored.

PLEASE always state which version of Microsoft Office you are using -
**2004**, X or 2001. It's often impossible to answer your questions
otherwise.

 

[Bill Weylock]

Sorry I missed that.

I am standing in the corner looking extremely contrite. Of course you can¹t
see that because I¹m standing in the corner.

He said in his first message:


It's very nice that you want to help, Bill, but please read the whole thread
first.

Take Matt's suggestion, Look up a Mac OS X or Unix book on permissions; try
Mac OS X Hints website. You need to open Terminal and change permissions on
the file to remove the "x" for that file. Or use a user-friendly app like
BatChmod to do it.

Panther 10.3.6
Office 2004
Windows XP Pro SP2
Office 2003

 

[John McGhie]

My guess (and it's only a guess...) is that it's the Macintosh file type
that's wrong: it should be MSWD.

Word for Windows wouldn't care, because it tends to ignore both the
extension and the file type and read the "Microsoft.Word.Document.8" line
from the internal file header to tell it what's going on.

Now: What happens when a Windows user saves the document under a different
name and sends it BACK to you?

If it opens then, my guess was correct (yaaaayyy!!!) (Windows Word will
write the correct Mac file type back into the file.) If it still doesn't,
there's something nasty happened to the file associations on that machine
(and I'm outta here because I have no idea what to do next...)

Cheers

Thanks - unfortunately it didn't change anything.

Has anyone ever seen anything like this before?

This user can email a Windows user the corrupted files and the Windows
user can open them. What gives?

Mike

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Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410