Two Word behaviors I'd like to change if possible

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Guest

Although I'm not exactly new to Word, I'm sure my questions would come from
the beginner's box.

I'm running XP Pro with Office 2003.

Question 1:
If I have one or more Word docs open and minimized, and then open yet
another document, the last doc I was working with will be restored before the
one just launched opens. Is there a way to stop this behaviour?

Question 2:
Sometimes, but not always, when I select text with the cursor and then
change the font or bold or change font color for the selected text, Word will
apply those changes to the entire document. I can press Ctrl+Z, and the
document returns to the 'correct' state and I have the results I wanted.
Later, if I make a similar change in the document, Word applies not only the
new change to the entire document, but also the edits I made earlier are
applied.

For example: Say I select a group of text and bold it. The entire document
changes to bold text. Ctrl+Z, and the document goes back to 'normal' and my
selected text is indeed bolded. Then I select more text, and I want to change
font color and font size. I change the color, and the entire document is that
color and bolded. Ctrl+Z again. I then change the font size, and the entire
document changes to the above mentioned color, is bold, and is the font size
I wanted for the selected text.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Tim
 
Mornin', CyberTaz.

Thanks for taking the time. Neither suggestion works, but I do appreciate
the effort. To save myself some time when prepping documents, I'll go back to
using OpenOffice's Writer, and then copy it to Word for distribution. This
approach always works. I was just hoping that when I installed Office 2003,
these 'features' would have been corrected.

Thanks again,
Tim
 
I'd be very surprised if CyberTaz's solution to (2) didn't work, as it has
provided the answer to this identical problem for hundreds (perhaps
thousands) of users.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

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all may benefit.
 
I don't think you can change the first behaviour but I wouldn't consider it
any more than a very minor annoyance myself - just look away from the screen
for a moment :) - I know there are one or two more subtle effects of it but
it's hardly a serious flaw. There are, actually, ways of opening documents
which do avoid this (e.g. using a separate instance of Word) but they have
implications and effects beyond the essentially cosmetic one you describe.

For the second, I'm afraid I can't offer anything more than CyberTaz's link.
 
Hi, Suzanne.

Okay. I went back to the instructions in CyberTaz's reply. This time,
however, I used the suggestion for previous versions of Word (even though I'm
using 2003). At first blush, it now seems to be working as I'd like. Here's
hoping it lasts.

Thank you, Suzanne, and CyberTaz, thanks again.

-Tim
 
Good Morning.


I have to empathize with Tim on this. While the CyberTaz solution fixes the
symptoms it does so at the expense of the flexibility of other features. The
ability to have individual documents in their own separate instance of Word
(or at least their own separate task bar icon) is desirable for many reasons.
Once you toggle the feature set off as CyberTaz suggests you lose the other
features as well. ...So, I ask respectfully - is there no way to have my
cake and eat it too? I want the ability to have multiple independent
documents in their own task bar icon without having them assume I want them
all re-opened on the desktop whenever I decide I want to open a new word
document?

....this is an annoyance to everyone in the office where I work. One of
those quirky things that everyone noticed but no one mentioned until someone
said something one day. Then everyone chimed in and commiserated...

Chris
 
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