What does [Private] mean in reveal codes?
Kathy Hoadley
Whenever we have a non-cooperative document (problems with reapplying styles
etc.) this word is visible next to some text when reveal codes are turned
on.
We have been told that this is actually a cut and paste of wordperfect which
corrupts the Word document.
Suzanne S. Barnhill
WordPerfect) or even another version of Word that can't be used by the
version of Word currently in use (such as Word 2000 features not supported
by Word 97). It's generally needed for "round-tripping," i.e., converting
the document back to the original application. If you don't plan to do that,
the codes can be safely deleted.
--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft Word MVP
Words into Type
Fairhope, AL USA
Kathy Hoadley <khoa...@cra.ca> wrote in message
news:uPI5R1hq$GA.268@cppssbbsa05...
Mohammed Afif
M Afif
Suzanne S. Barnhill
referring to was toggling on display of field codes as opposed to field
results (Alt+F9).
--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft Word MVP
Words into Type
Fairhope, AL USA
Mohammed Afif <mda...@mail.seychelles.net> wrote in message
news:On3H9tVr$GA.272@cppssbbsa04...
John McGhie [MVP - Word]
-0300, "Kathy Hoadley" <khoa...@cra.ca> wrote:
> Does anyone know what{Private} means when it shows up in a document?
> Whenever we have a non-cooperative document (problems with reapplying styles
> etc.) this word is visible next to some text when reveal codes are turned
> on.
>
> We have been told that this is actually a cut and paste of wordperfect which
> corrupts the Word document.
Kathy:
What you have been told is both right and wrong.
The PRIVATE field contains conversion settings that have been stored by Word
in case it ever has to convert the document back to the format it came from
(usually WordPerfect, but you will see PRIVATE fields in documents from
other word processors also.)
These fields are more common in converted WordPerfect text because the
internal structure of Word and WordPerfect documents is radically different,
so the converter has to think a lot harder when going from one to the other.
You can safely remove the fields if you do not anticipate converting the
document back to its originating format.
Now, it is not true that the PRIVATE field corrupts the document. It *is*
true that the fact that the document came from a source that required
PRIVATE fields is the source of your trouble.
Yeah, I know, splitting hairs. The point I am making is that if Word could
understand what it wrote in the PRIVATE field, the document probably
wouldn't be corrupt.
Conversion corruption was endemic with the first version of Word 97
converting to or from Word 6, Word 95, or WordPerfect. The converter was
extremely buggy. Make sure you have at least Office Service Release 2
applied to every copy of Word 97 (including all the copies in staff member's
homes) that could touch the documents before you go any further. Otherwise
you will get all the corruptions right back again next week.
Note that even in Word 97 OSR-2, the converter is not good enough to keep
converting to and from earlier formats. Once the document is in Word 97
format, it must stay in that format, otherwise chances are it will corrupt
again any time anyone converts it back to an earlier version (Word 2
excepted). So you CANNOT allow users to set Word 6/95 as their default save
format and continue working in Word 97. Doing this involves a conversion to
Word 97 every time they open the document,a nd a conversion to Word 6/95
every time they save it. This will break the document within a day or so.
I keep a copy of Word 95 installed for working in Word 6 and 95 documents.
Often the quickest way to fix a document corrupted this way is to save it
out to Word 2 for Windows format. Yes, Word will swear at you and threaten
you with the loss of the family jewels. It's full of shit, ignore it!
Chances are the only "formatting" you will lose is the stuff that's causing
the bother. The Word 2 format is much simpler than either Word 6/95 or Word
97/2000, and as such, it is incapable of containing almost all of the things
that cause problems. Word is forced to remove them when it exports the
file.
Close Word, re-start it (re-boot the computer if you are on Windows 95 or
98) and open the Word 2 version. Immediately save it back as a Word 97/2000
document and carry on.
OK, for the perfectionists amongst us, yes, saving back to Word 2 format
does delete some features that are possible in Word 97/2000 but are not
possible in Word 2. Things like animated text and multi-level automatic
numbering...
But given that these problems usually show up early during a conversion
process, before you have had a chance to use any of Word's more esoteric
features, the loss is usually not great. As for the numbering, that's
usually the cause of the problem, so you have to lose it to lose the
problem. The numbers will be converted to typed characters. You can
usually see where the problem was when you get the document back: the
indenting will be stuffed.
Just be careful with documents that contain a lot of graphics: make sure you
save a copy of the bad document, because you will have to retrieve the
graphics from it later.
Hope this helps.
Doug Thornton
"Suzanne S. Barnhill" <sbar...@zebra.net> wrote in message
news:O3lKHcZr$GA.291@cppssbbsa03...
> Word doesn't really have "Reveal Codes" in the WP sense. What the writer
was
> referring to was toggling on display of field codes as opposed to field
> results (Alt+F9).
>
> --
> Suzanne S. Barnhill
> Microsoft Word MVP
> Words into Type
> Fairhope, AL USA
>
> Mohammed Afif <mda...@mail.seychelles.net> wrote in message
> news:On3H9tVr$GA.272@cppssbbsa04...
> > What? Reveal Codes in WORD? I thought they existed only in
WordPerfect!
> >
> > M Afif
> >
> > "Kathy Hoadley" <khoa...@cra.ca> wrote in message
> > news:uPI5R1hq$GA.268@cppssbbsa05...
Bill Coan [Word MVP]
that it doesn't)
--
Bill Coan
Templates, wizards, add-ins, and macros for Word
For more information, visit: www.wordsite.com
>
>
Doug Thornton <DougTh...@email.com> wrote in message
news:8e6u8s$hnl$1...@bob.news.rcn.net...
Suzanne S. Barnhill
carefully I selected a text block (either for cut and paste or for drag and
drop), when I pasted or dropped it, I found that some of the essential
formatting codes had been left behind at the previous location. Very
frustrating.
--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft Word MVP
Words into Type
Fairhope, AL USA
Bill Coan [Word MVP] <bill...@wordmacros.com> wrote in message
news:#$FPYx4r$GA.187@cppssbbsa04...
Dave Rado
Regards
Dave
John Nurick
<sbar...@zebra.net> wrote:
>Well, when I last used it, it sort of did, but invariably no matter how
>carefully I selected a text block (either for cut and paste or for drag and
>drop), when I pasted or dropped it, I found that some of the essential
>formatting codes had been left behind at the previous location. Very
>frustrating.
AFAIR it was actually WordPerfect that introduced drag-and-drop
editing to the Windows world, in one of the very first Windows
versions (5.0 or 5.1), and it was quite incredibly badly worked out.
Microsoft had nothing to match it until Word 97 came out and people
tried dragging and dropping numbered paragraphs!
--
John
Please reply to the newsgroup and not by e-mail. That way, more
brain cells get to work on the problem!
John McGhie [MVP - Word]
-0400, "Doug Thornton" <DougTh...@email.com> wrote:
> Wouldn't it be great if Word did have Reveal Codes
Nope!
To see why, save your document as RTF.
Now, change the file extension to "txt" and open it in WordPad.
That's as close as you will come to Word's native document format and still
be human-readable. Enjoy!
Just to explain: A Word document is a nested set of containers. Each
container has "properties" and inherits some properties from the container
the contains it.
The "Outer-most" container is the Computer. Within it, in order, are Word,
the document, the sections, the paragraphs, and the characters.
Word's "Reveal Codes" feature (yes, it does exist) is the blue
Arrow-and-Question-mark button on the Formatting toolbar. (In Word 2000,
they moved it to the Help menu, but you can soon put it back, and I would, I
use it regularly).
You click this button, then click the text. It shows you what "properties"
are current at that specific character position.
In Word, those "properties" determine what you are going to get. Any codes
that may or may not exist are ignored. Word works on the properties: if the
property says "bold", bold it will be. If the property you are looking for
does not appear at that point, it will not appear in the printout either.
Note that that button only looks at TEXT properties. You need to use
File/Page Setup to see the Section properties that will aso affect how the
document displays and prints.
Hope this helps.
Please post follow-up questions to the newsgroup so that all may follow the thread.
John McGhie <jo...@mcghie-information.com.au>
Consultant Technical Writer
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Sydney, Australia (GMT +10 hrs) +61 (04) 1209 1410
Tonya Marshall
I have gotten {PRIVATE} fields when I have copied and pasted from web
pages. I just delete them.
In Word97 help this is what they say about the private field:
Field codes: Private field
{ PRIVATE }
Stores data for documents converted from other file formats. Word
inserts a PRIVATE field when converting file formats; the field contains
data needed for converting a document back to its original file format.
A PRIVATE field is formatted as hidden text and doesn't affect the
document layout in Word. To hide a PRIVATE field, don't display hidden
text.
Peter Boulding
<sbar...@zebra.net> wrote:
>Well, when I last used it, it sort of did, but invariably no matter how
>carefully I selected a text block (either for cut and paste or for drag and
>drop), when I pasted or dropped it, I found that some of the essential
>formatting codes had been left behind at the previous location. Very
>frustrating.
Ah - you should have 'revealed codes' first! :)
--
Regards
Peter Boulding Microsoft Word MVP
p...@UNSPAMpboulding.co.uk (to e-mail, remove "UNSPAM")
[Please reply to the newsgroup. E-mail queries may be ignored.]
Peter Jamieson
Wouldn't it be great if all these packages were so reliable and had such an
informative UI that you never felt the need for a reveal codes feature :-)
Peter
"Doug Thornton" <DougTh...@email.com> wrote in message
news:8e6u8s$hnl$1...@bob.news.rcn.net...
> Wouldn't it be great if Word did have Reveal Codes
>
> "Suzanne S. Barnhill" <sbar...@zebra.net> wrote in message
> news:O3lKHcZr$GA.291@cppssbbsa03...
> > Word doesn't really have "Reveal Codes" in the WP sense. What the writer
> was
> > referring to was toggling on display of field codes as opposed to field
> > results (Alt+F9).
> >
> > --
> > Suzanne S. Barnhill
> > Microsoft Word MVP
> > Words into Type
> > Fairhope, AL USA
> >
> > Mohammed Afif <mda...@mail.seychelles.net> wrote in message
> > news:On3H9tVr$GA.272@cppssbbsa04...
> > > What? Reveal Codes in WORD? I thought they existed only in
> WordPerfect!
> > >
> > > M Afif
> > >
Dave Rado
Regards
Dave
Chris Snyder <chris_...@fishgame.state.ak.us> wrote in message
news:390A23B6...@fishgame.state.ak.us...
| But Word does have a reveal codes function, it should be ALT+F9 -if that
is what you were asking about.
Suzanne S. Barnhill
in the desired position relative to the formatting codes, yet they were
STILL left behind! This is what was so frustrating.
--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft Word MVP
Words into Type
Fairhope, AL USA
Peter Boulding <p...@UNSPAMpboulding.co.uk> wrote in message
news:v30fgskbj3o842ffa...@4ax.com...