Word 2007 - Thesaurus Won't Open

[Jim Lally]

OK, I have an end user who at one time had BOTH Office 2003 AND 2007 on
their machine. It was then that he noticed that, in Word 2007, the
Thesaurus will not open. Hitting Shift + F7 does NOTHING.

When I open Excel 2007, however, the Shift + F7 opens the Thesaurus right up
with no problem at all.

I tried removing the Office 2003 install (even uninstalled both and then
reinstalled ONLY Office 2007 but still no dice!)

Any idea how I can get the Thesaurus to open in Word 2007. BTW, it's not
just the Shift + F7....no matter how I select the Thesaurus in Word 2007 it
won't open.

HELP!!!

Thanks!

(e-mail address removed)

 

[Herb Tyson [MVP]]

When you right-click a word, there should be a Synonyms item in the context
menu (3rd from the bottom). Is it there? If so, then it's possible that
Shift+F7 was reassigned, or that a foreign keyboard has been toggled on,
rendering that keystroke ineffective (although, this doesn't usually happen
with the F keys).

A diagnostic to try... start Word with the /a switch (winword.exe /a). Does
starting Word this way "fix" the problem? If so, then it might be a)
corrupted normal.dotm, or b) corrupted Data key in the registry. Let me know
if you need more info on how to deal with either of these.

If starting with the /a switch (a diagnostic... not a cure) doesn't produce
correct behavior, then you've probably already accomplished the equivalent
of doing a repair, so it might be that the Windows user profile is
corrupted. Try creating a new user login, and see if the new user has the
same problem.

 

[Jim Lally]

Mr. Tyson:

Thank you for getting me on the right track. Starting word with the
winword.exe /a switch does indeed make the thesautus work.

So, per your instruction, I've got either a corrupt normal.dotm file or a
bad reg key entry.

Any chance you can point me in the right direction on resolving? If it
helps, this user at one time had BOTH Office 2003 and 2007 on their laptop
and I wonder if that led me to a bad registry key?

Whatever the case, some guidance / help would be MUCH appreciated.

Thanks.

(and as an added bonus Q, this same user uses Netscape for their mail and
they want to be able to send mail to Netscape from within Word or Excel.
Clicking on the File --> Send Mail (is that it, I am going on memory here)
doesnt do it.....also the user is running Vista which has been a total
nightmare).

Thanks again!!!

 

[Herb Tyson [MVP]]

The following article has general instructions on dealing with registry and
normal.dot (or normal.dotm) and other add-in issues (the title of the
article notwithstanding):

http://word.mvps.org/FAQS/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm

Note that Word 2007 is Word 12.0, so you'll need to make the appropriate
"adjustment" when applying the article's advice.

To find out where normal.dot or normal.dotm (Word 2007) are located, when
you choose File Open, one of the locations shown in Favorite Links is
Templates. So, click on Templates, then click in the address bar so you can
copy that location. In Vista, it should be here:

C:\Users\[user name]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates

Because of the way Word 2007 work, rename both Normal.dot and Normal.dotm
(if Word doesn't see Normal.dotm, it will load Normal.dot, instead, and then
save a new Normal.dotm; since you don't know where the problem is, it's best
to eliminate both from the equation).

Note that renaming these and registry surgery should be done with Word NOT
running. Make sure that winword.exe does not appear in the process list in
the task manager. Otherwise, efforts can fail, and changes won't "take".

In Word 2007, the registry entry suspect would be here:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Data

But this one can also cause problems:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Options

Rather than deleting, I would simply rename. For example, looking in my
registry at the moment, I see that I have older renamed keys named
....\Data.x and ...\Data.y.

The big problem in your case is that there is no error message. The
thesaurus simply doesn't respond. If nothing here works, then we can think
about other avenues to try.

Cheers,

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

 

[Jim Lally]

I had tried deleting the normal.dotm (and normal.dot) templates before you
had gotten back in touch but no dice.

I then tried renaming both keys that you mentioned (the data and the options
keys)....still no dice.

Still try to open the Thesaurus and nothing.

Is it possible to maybe try assiging the Thesaurus to another key entirely?
As long as it works, ya know?

Thanks for looking into it. You are the Word guru at the top of the
mountain!

jim

 

[Herb Tyson [MVP]]

Assigning to another key -- or fixing Shift+F7 -- would be fine. But, that's
why I asked whether other routes to the thesaurus were blocked. I was trying
to eliminate a Shift+F7 issue as a possibility, but I inferred a lack of an
answer as meaning that this didn't work either. At the risk of being
redundant, let me repeat what I asked before:

When you right-click a word, there should be a Synonyms item in the context
menu (3rd from the bottom). Is it there? If so, then it's possible that
Shift+F7 was reassigned, or that a foreign keyboard has been toggled on,
rendering that keystroke ineffective (although, this doesn't usually happen
with the F keys).

If the thesaurus doesn't respond in other ways, then it's likely a user
profile issue, and assigning a different key or "fixing Shift+F7" won't
help.

So... my question is: Is the only thing broken the Shift+F7 assignment? Or,
are other routes to the thesaurus not working as well?

If other routes to the thesaurus are working, then the problem can be fixed
quite simply:

1. Press Ctrl+Alt+[plus sign on number pad]

2. Press Shift+F7.

See what it's assigned to. If it's assigned to something other than
ToolsThesaurusRR, then click Shift+F7 in the Current Keys box, then click
Remove. Then click Close.

The problem should now be fixed, since removing an alternative assignment
causes a built-in keystroke to revert to its default assignment.