Extremely Odd Word Document

[CoolRunnings]

Ok here's one that has me stumped. I have a file that a customer of mine sent and she says it reads as gibberish. I open it and it reads just fine and I can print it. She's using Office 2007 and I'm using Office 2010. Here's where things get really odd:

If I try to change the font in the text of the document on my computer, it changes to gibberish. If I take that same file that reads ok for me and try to open it on her computer, it reads as if the font were some greek format! Can anyone tell me what's up with this file? I have linked the original document and a PDF (just so if you can't open it you can see what it's supposed to look like) below.

http://www.fileden.com/files/2012/4/11/3290466/ERM RH B&B Movie Collection.docx

http://www.fileden.com/files/2012/4/11/3290466/ERM RH B&B Movie Collection.pdf

 

[Steltek]

The document uses the SuperFrench font - if this font isn't present on the system the document is being opened on, it will display as gibberish. The reason it does this is the same reason you can't edit the text font - the issue is related to the SuperFrench font itself. I think that it is an old symbol font, and the font character codes in Word don't align properly with any other font. Word thus can't substitute another font if it is missing from the system, and by the same token you can't edit and change the font for the same reason.

I was able to fix the problem by inserting and running the following macro on the document (I can't take credit for it, as I didn't write it -- it is something I picked up to fix a similar problem several years ago and saved):

' Make sure the symbol font isn't used in your style definition(s)
Dim myChar As Range
For Each myChar In ActiveDocument.Characters
Select Case AscW(myChar)
Case &HF000 To &HF0FF
' if the symbol font isn't in your style definition, you can use the
' following line to set the font to that defined in the style.
myChar.Font.Name = myChar.Style.Font.Name
myChar.Text = ChrW(AscW(myChar) - &HF000)
End Select
Next myChar

To run the macro, open the original document. Press ALT-F11 in Word to run the VBA editor. Click on Tools menu in the Editor, select Macros. Enter a macro name (i.e. Macro1) in the box that pops up and hit Create. Copy/paste the macro text shown above in between the SUB and END SUB in the code window. Close the code window, then close the VBA editor window. In the Word ribbon on your document, hit View and then select Macros. Your macro (e.g. Macro1) should be available - run it. It may take a minute or two to run - if you have all pages of the document open in print layout mode, you can actually watch it make the font changes as it runs.

Once it completes, hit File, Save as, and your new file name. You'll get a pop up box that says "The following cannot be saved in a macro free document". Just select "Yes" to save the file without including the macro. You should now be able to edit the fonts in the newly saved document.

Hope this helps. If you can't get it to work, drop me a PM and I'll email the copy of the document I ran the macro on.

FYI: Encourage the customer not to use the SuperFrench font again for the main body of the document, or the problem will likely happen again....

EDIT: Further testing seems to indicate that you can go back to the SuperFrench font again after the fix, but I'm not sure that the problem won't just recur again at some point in the future.

 

[radhak]

Wow, Steltek! Middle of the night, too!

An idle question - could she not simply select the entire text and changed the font?

 

[Steltek]

Wow, Steltek! Middle of the night, too!

An idle question - could she not simply select the entire text and changed the font?

Yeah, was sick and couldn't sleep....

Concerning changing the font, it won't work. If you try to edit the text of the original document in any way (including changing the font), each character of the text is replaced with a square placeholder box (i.e. it turns to gibberish). In this case, running the provided macro fixes the problem and allows you to edit the font and/or text.