#1
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How to type EF BB EF in MS Word find/replace box
Hello everyone
I have an MS Word file with a mystery character in it. I want to know how to find/replace this character (i.e. how to type it in the find/replace dialog). When I enable viewing of non-printing characters, I see it as a little box. I managed to capture the character to a plaintext file (in the attachment between the two brackets). When I open that in a hex editor, I'm surprised to see that the mystery character is the same as a UTF8 BOM, namely EF BB BF. Can anyone please tell me (a) how to type this character in MS Word and (b) how to type it in the find/replace dialog? Thanks Samuel |
#2
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Your text file contains just two characters: > and <. If you want us to see what's in a document, please attach the document to a post.
PS: I don't understand why you'd attach a zipped 8 byte file that's actually 130 bytes larger than the file being zipped...
__________________
Cheers, Paul Edstein [Fmr MS MVP - Word] |
#3
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Quote:
If you can see only two characters, then it mean that either (a) you opened it in a text editor that doesn't support unsupported characters or (b) you opened it in MS Word but did not switch on the view of non-printing characters. Quote:
Anyway, I have since found two methods of getting the character's appropriate code in MS Word. Method 1 (if you want to be able to type the character): First find out the character's UTF8 hex code (e.g. save it as plain text and view it in a hex editor), then search for it in the fileformat.info site, e.g. to search for EFBBBF (notice I made a mistake in the thread title... it's not EFBBEF) you'd visit this link.
Method 2 (simpler, but then you can't type the character directly): Start recording a macro, select the character, and press Ctrl+H to open a find/replace dialog (the "find" field will appear empty). Then do a quick dummy find/replace, and then stop recording the macro. The code to use in MS Word will then be visible in the macro -- in the case of my character, it's ChrW(65279). To find this character, in the Find dialog type ^u65279. If you know of simpler ways of (a) finding out what character it is and (b) typing it directly without consulting a web site, I'll be happy to hear it. Thanks Samuel |
#4
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Quote:
As for the character itself, it's a Zero-width No-break Space. You could see that quite easily by selecting it in Word and choosing Insert>Symbol>More Symbols.
__________________
Cheers, Paul Edstein [Fmr MS MVP - Word] |
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