why can't I drag and drop text?

[Guest]

All of a sudden, whenever I try to drag and drop text in a Word 2003 document,
a line appears under the text and it won't move. I don't know what I've done
to cause this - anyone have any ideas?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Do you have "Drag-and-drop text editing" checked on the Edit tab of Tools |
Options? Is the text the result of a field (such as IncludeText)?

--
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]

Your initial post is a couple of months old, but I am suddenly having the
same problem - not able to drag/drop text. In fact, the "no" symbol (circle
with slash through it) appears as soon as I try to drag. Suzanne, to answer
your ?s, yes, the Drag-and-drop text editing option <is> selected. And no, I
am not trying to drag a field; just plain old text.

FWIW, I'm able to drag-drop in Powerpoint and Outlook, and in this browser
field.

I am using Word 2003, SP2 on Windows XP Professional 5.1, SP2.

Thanks anyone for any help. I like to use drag/drop frequently!

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

In general, you can drag text only into areas where there is already text;
you can't drag it outside the margins or beyond the end-of-document marker.

--
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]

I'm having the same problem. I get the "no" symbol when I drag selected
text. I am not allowed to drop the text into other text. This began
sometime last week, and has metastasized such that all new word documents
forbid drag-and-drop. I don't know what option I might have changed to cause
this.

I can cut-and-paste or copy-and-paste text just fine. The drag-and-drop box
in Tools/Options/Edit is checked. Unchecking it does not fix the problem,
but does make it so that I can't drag text.

I'm using Word 2003 SP2 on Windows XP Home Edition version 5.1.2600 with SP2
Build 2600.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Jon

 

[Guest]

Suzanne,
Sorry for the late response (holidays and all that). Yes, I know where
dragged text can be dropped (but thx for the thought). I cannot drag/drop
text into any (correct) text position on any page; now I see that jons73 is
having the same problem.

If you or anyone has discovered a solution to this irritating prob., would
appreciate hearing it very much. Imagine that jons73 also would welcome it -
he seems to be in the same boat.

Again, thanks for offering something (albeit not the solution).

 

[Guest]

I found a solution! Jons73 and anyone else w/the drag-drop problem (or other
settings problems), try this: Close any open Word files (do not quit Word).
From the Help menu, choose Detect and Repair. This is supposed to fix
problems in Word, and it did fix the drag-drop prob. for me. For more info on
fixing problems, see Knowledge Base article 822005, "How to reset user
options and registry settings in Microsoft Office Word..."

Yea-a-a-a!

 

[Guest]

Today my drag-and-drop problem disappeared. I don't know what might have
caused this, but I will try this trick if it comes back. Thanks for finding
this solution.

Jon

 

[johnford1963]

Ensure no MS Word dialog boxes are open. For example I often keep the "Find" box open when reading a long document to look up material or find acronyms. When the box is open I can't drag and drop. Close the "Find" box and TaDaaa, it works again!