ABERRANT AUTOFORMAT

[Guest]

Hi,

Can anyone explain why Word 2003 has started implementing AutoFormats
without my having to press Enter or any other trigger?

In other words, Word is set to replace "ws" with "was". I used to have to
type "ws" and then press Enter, Return or Spacebar. Now, however, as soon as
I type "ws", Word immediately replaces it with "was".

It's a bit annoying.

Thanks,

 

[Jay Freedman]

You're confusing three separate features (although Micorosft fosters the
confusion by giving them all names that start with "Auto").

AutoFormat has nothing to do with this, although it is annoying in its own
way (see http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/TameAutoFormat.htm).

The feature that involves a trigger (the F3 key, or the Enter or Tab key if
the entry's name is unique after four characters or more) is called
"AutoText". It's accessed through the Insert > AutoText menu. See
http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/Customization/AutoText.htm for details.

The feature that makes replacements without any separate trigger (just
typing a space or punctuation after a recognized item) is called
"AutoCorrect". It's accessed through the Tools > AutoCorrect Options menu.

In either feature, Word should not recognize characters that are part of a
large word as candidates for replacement. Is that what's happening?

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

To add to what Jay has said ws > was is one of Word's built-in AutoCorrect
entries.

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

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Guest]

Hi,

You're right, I was confusing AutoCorrect with AutoFormat.

Yes, Word is recognizing characters within larger words -- that's what's so
annoying.

Do you know of any way to correc this?

 

[Jay Freedman]

I don't have any idea what's causing it, so I can't begin to suggest a
solution.

AutoCorrect, as I said, doesn't change items within larger words --
the recognition system relies on the "trigger" being delimited on both
ends by spaces or punctuation. That makes me suspect some other active
mechanism, such as a macro or add-in.

Try starting Word with the /a switch in the command line, as described
in http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm. If
that stops the behavior, then you know that the cause lies in one of
three places: the Normal.dot template, an add-in, or a registry
setting. As far as I know, there's no registry setting that could
possibly be involved in this particular problem, so investigate the
other two, using the steps in the article (renaming Normal.dot,
emptying the Startup folder, etc.).

I'll emphasize that if the /a switch stops the problem, it is _not_
the permanent fix. It disables things in Word that you really need to
work normally; it's only a troubleshooting aid.

 

[Guest]

Hi,

Turning off AutoCorrect in the AutoCorrect... dialog, using Word for a while
without it and then re-enabling the feature seems to have cured the problem.

Go figure!

Thanks for your help.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

AutoCorrect, as I said, doesn't change items within larger words --

Except, as we've seen, if you insert a conditional hyphen, which should not
be (but unfortunately is) interpreted as punctuation.

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

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

I don't have any idea what's causing it, so I can't begin to suggest a
solution.

AutoCorrect, as I said, doesn't change items within larger words --
the recognition system relies on the "trigger" being delimited on both
ends by spaces or punctuation. That makes me suspect some other active
mechanism, such as a macro or add-in.

Try starting Word with the /a switch in the command line, as described
in http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/ProbsOpeningWord.htm. If
that stops the behavior, then you know that the cause lies in one of
three places: the Normal.dot template, an add-in, or a registry
setting. As far as I know, there's no registry setting that could
possibly be involved in this particular problem, so investigate the
other two, using the steps in the article (renaming Normal.dot,
emptying the Startup folder, etc.).

I'll emphasize that if the /a switch stops the problem, it is _not_
the permanent fix. It disables things in Word that you really need to
work normally; it's only a troubleshooting aid.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP




--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup

so all may benefit.