We're having a big problem with hyperlinking here at our office. A big part of our job is creating work papers that consist of Word and Excel documents usually distributed between 4 folders, all contained in one primary folder. We need to hyperlink many, many words and numbers to source documents. The source documents are always contained in 1 of the 4 folders. We need to move the primary folder back and forth between various different drives within our network - sometimes to an external drive.



The problem is the links get "broken." We are told that we must somehow insure that our links use a relative path. We are told that in order to verify that the link is relative, we should right click on the link and select "edit hyperlink." We are told that if the link address shown starts with "C" or "\\ad" - the link is not relative and will not work for other users.

How can insure that my links use the relative path and will work after moving the primary folder to different drives?

To see how to implement relative paths in Word, check out the solution I've posted at:
http://windowssecrets.com/forums/sho...l=1#post584769

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Thanks Paul, I'll check it out.

Paul, I'm afraid I can't understand that solution and I don't think it will work for us for the following reason - we hyperling from Word to other Word documents but also to Excel documents and from Excel documents. The links don't all go to one document so I'm not sure the macro will work - or am I missing it all together?

Your previous post referred only to links from Word documents. The solution in the link I posted will work for that. As I know nothing of your folder structure or how the links are meant to traverse that structure, though, the advice can't be more specific.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

- Oh Well...I'll just hope for the best for now.

Some here have said that dragging and droping a file from one folder to another will break the link. Please note that these and links to other documents - sometimes Excel files. We also know that "saving as" will cause problem. We know the problem - we just need a solution to creating a good hyperlink from the get go.

Well, if you're saving a file via Save As with a new filename or to a different folder, no hyperlink in another closed file pointing to the old file is ever going to know about the new one. AFAIK there isn't an application that's ever been written that could do that (some applications will update links to other files in the same application if both files are opened when the save is done). Besides, imagine the chaos if the SaveAs was simply intended for making a copy and not for changing the hyperlink destination!

As I've already said, without knowing your folder structure and the linking relationships, no-one can give specific advice. The link I provided explains the principles for Word documents in enough detail for reliable implementation - plenty of people use those techniques.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Yes, we have already determined that "saving as" will break links. File structure is as follows. There is a primary folder with 4 or 5 sub-folders. Links are made from Word documents within any of the sub-folders to any of the other sub-folders or within sub-folders. Link are made from Word to Excel and vice-versa. We know that changing the name of any of the folders will cause problems.