I write pretty heavy medical stuff, and this program that was rammed down my throat continually changes what I write to what it THINKS it should be... While proofing a paper from one of the world's top cardiologists, it randomly changed a mu (MICROgram) into an m (MILLIgram; 1000x the dose). Anyone given that dose would have been swimming in his/her own blood on the table. Luckily, I remembered his speeches.



Is there any way I can turn it into my old trusty Royal typewriter??? I hit a key and that's what I get? The right font, the right color, the right place on the page, the right indentation, the right spacing...etc, etc etc. Then I can format the way it needs to be formatted?

I'm not a novice. I'm a former LAN administrator and have been using word since it refused to recognize WP51 any more. I've gone all over the options. I stipped all formatting, I've changed defaults. I took off all auto-whatevers...BUT The next time I boot up... they're all changed back.

I'm serious. I can't afford to spend 20% of my time fighting this program any longer.

Can anyone help?

I'd appreciate it. Thanx.

I believe that what you need to do, is not simply change the optins in your document, but in the template on which it is base.d This is probably Normal.dotm. Go to the Office button adn select New/Installed templates. Normal.dotm should be listed. Be sure to Open it, so that you see Normal.dotm in the title bar, not Document 1. Make the changes you want (no auto corrects, formatting, etc.) and save the template.

Does that do the trick?

I'll give it a go as soon as I get off this murderous deadline... But it does sound logical!

Then it must be wrong.

It fights me, too, and I am utterly sick of it. In the good old days of Word 2.0 (superb word-processor!) it took up 1.4 Mb and did everything I wanted. Now, I have just no idea how to start. Totally unnecessary for ordinary word-processing. Typing this message, for example, I have all the options I need.

Isn't there a single button you can select to remove all settings and start from scratch? That's what I would call logical, so no hope there, then.

Thanx, Belix, for seeing what I've been seeing.

Microsoft apparently targets its products to idiots, and if it senses any deviation from what it's programmed to understand, immediately changes what the operator wants to what it thinks the operator should want!

Do you know of anyone really using the new .docx format? But at times, we're forced to use it, and clients can't open our files!

I lost an entire department at a major communications firm because of the fights started between writers and an editor by this idiotic approach (in this case, word was changing languages every time it encountered a foreign name, making spell check impossible). At that time, I was able to finally fix it with WP51, but now that's even out of the question.

I just turned in my assignment (I let the client format it!), so I'm going to try the fix that was suggested. I'll update if it works!

Happy holidays!

For idiots, perhaps, but you need to be a wizard to find out how to adjust the settings, or heaven forbid, turn them off. Numbered lists you never asked for, paragraph format carried over, or pasted in, indenting you don't want, styles you can't understand, it goes on. I suspect it is all to show just how much Microsoft does for you.

And despite all of this, there is no way to store clipboard contents for future use!

"And despite all of this, there is no way to store clipboard contents for future use!"

I do this by making new docs in that particular directory titled "Notes-XXXXDate.doc" "Notes-EptifAEs121610" Then just dump the clipboard there for future use as many times as you fill it.

How do you dump it? Just copy and paste? Do the entries remain separate?

Just paste them in.

You can use page breaks between sections, or draw a line of dashes between them.

I've attached a simple one where I've swaved links, abstracts and whatnot

Attached Files

NotesDMPipeline102310.doc (138.5 KB, 11 views)

Ulodesk,

Slowly, very slowly, I think this approach is working... But, like any other time, formatting a template is difficult because it keeps resetting itself while I'm trying to strip it! Is there a way I can "Reveal Codes" like in WP? (I don't think the codes available for viewing here are as all-encompassing as they were in WP51.) It would be so darn easy if I could just delete the codes I want to delete.The last time I was able to view a word doc in WP51, I saw that word just kept adding codes, no matter what it was told to do. For example, Turn X on remained when you turned X off, so that the codes would read text{Xon}{Xoff}{Xon}TEXT{Xoff} and you have no way of cleaning it up!

With WP51, all you had to do was a global search for cond "on" and replace it with nothing. Bang! Problem solved. Once I had determined the problem with the paper involved in my crisis mentioned above, it took less than 20 keystrokes to clean a 30-page paper!

I have 2 suggestions to microsoft:

1: No reason to change the program per se... Distribute the program with only 3 options installed, but changeable on the installation menu: Preferred font, paper size, and margins. EVERY OTHER PIECE OF GINGERBREAD SHOULD BE OPT-IN.
2: Rather than applaud gates for donating $Billions to a PR effort to make him look like somewhat of a human being, if not a gawd (gaud?), start refunding it to the people he has screwed.

Ulodesk, I do thank you for your suggestion; I'm trying to make it work. My tirade against ms is just the disgust I feel for having inferior products rammed down my throat because some cyber drug dealer gave free samples to hook the masses, then screwed them.

Merry Christmas!

CJinCNJ,
I have no experience in WP, though I'm familiar in principle with its code transparency and appreciate your frustration. Do let me know if I can help more specifically. And a Merry Christmas to you, as well!