Sonny Software

Hi,
I'm very happy with how Bookends 9.1 is working for me using Word 2004 11.3 on OS X 10.2.8. I do have a couple issues that I run into and was wondering if anyone has any tips on them.

1) I get inconsistent fonts with citations. When I scan a document to convert the temporary placeholders into citations, the fonts are sometimes very different from the rest of the document or even in boldface. I'm not sure why this is happening. I know that Word is funky in the way it has invisible format markers that can do odd things but would hope there is some way to work around this. Or maybe BE could be modified to include a font format marker whenever it inserts formatted citations? I've set the default font under General Preferences in BE but that hasn't helped.

2) When I spellcheck a document, sometimes it gets sort of held up on the citations. It'll ask me about the spelling of a name and I'll have to hit "okay" several times before it will go on to the next one. I haven't figured out what makes this happen. Actually, what would be even better is if there was some way to keep Word from spellchecking the names at all. I don't know how Word keeps track of what has been checked and what has not yet been checked but every time I redo the scanning of the citations I have to spellcheck all the names from scratch. If there was some way for BE to put in a notation that the names were already spell-checked, that would be an enormous help. I suppose this is actually a feature request.

Thanks!

Joe

Hi,

The first issue is due to your settings in the style sheets. Bookends will cause Word to use the font set in the style sheet for the paragraph it is in. So set the font to whatever you want to use (rather than overriding the style sheet with an ad hoc font change) and it will not change after a scan.

As for the second issue, that has to do with Word, not Bookends, and I'm afraid I don't know why it does that. Once the bibliography is in Word, Bookends has nothing to do with it. You'll have to file a bug report with Microsoft.

Jon
Sonny Software

Ah, I see! Knowing that it is based on the style sheets is very helpful. It would be nice if the fonts weren't based on that but I can work with it. As for the spellchecking, it's really not just a Word bug, it's a BookEnds-Word bug. The Word guys will just say that BE is doing something wrong and I should file a bug report with you. I hope you'll consider taking a look at it.

Joe

If you contacted Microsoft support, what did they say was wrong? The text is in a Word "field", but it's just text. There is nothing unusual about it, as far as I can tell.

Jon
Sonny Software

What Microsoft support? I looked on the website and it appears I would have to pay to get their help and it's really more a bug report than something that I expect they could help me with. I could send it in via the feedback mechanism but you don't get replies from that. The free support resource is a newsgroup. It seems to me that posting to it would be bad publicity for BookEnds. Is this really something you want me to do? Are you sure you couldn't just talk to them directly, programmer to programmer?

Joe

First, there is no "programmer to programmer" fraternity, and no special hotline. I have no more access to them than you.

Second, this is an issue you are experiencing but I haven't seen (nor has anyone else reported it). So there is nothing I can reproduce that I could report.

Third, the problem you are having is an issue with Word, not Bookends, which simply sends Word text. I can't help with bugs in Word. So yes, if you want to follow it up, it should be with Microsoft.

Jon
Sonny Software

Jon wrote:Third, the problem you are having is an issue with Word, not Bookends, which simply sends Word text. I can't help with bugs in Word. So yes, if you want to follow it up, it should be with Microsoft.

Just to follow up: it would probably be most effective to go through the MVP (Most Valuable Professional) "channel." MVPs are informal experts on various Office applications, and they have a good rapport with the developers at the MacBU (the people who develop Microsoft programs for the Mac). The easiest way to get in touch with the MVPs is through ... USENET newsgroups:

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/community/ ... newsgroups

Or you could try this direct link to the microsoft.public.mac.office.word newsgroup.
They are very helpful and knowledgeable.

Thanks nicka and thecritic, these are constructive and helpful suggestions.

Cheers!

Joe