Bloated Word Documents

[MMJJLL]

My Invoices are usually derived by taking the last one, and overtyping changes to dates, amounts etc

I've just noticed that although the file started off at 30kb, my latest invoices are over 600kb each.

I took one of these later documents, and stripped every last bit of text off it - it was still around 400kb.

There is no Tracking, or Fast Save selected.

What is causing these documents to be so big?

 

[DPlank]

Any VBA in the file?

Dave

"Probably the only Test Analyst on Tek-Tips"

Take a look at Forum1393 & sign up if you'd like

 

[MMJJLL]

None at all

 

[HughLerwill]

MMJJLL,

I discovered this in early versions of Word and I guess it still happens. If you load your bloated doc file into a plain text processor you will probably see most if not all the text which you have ever 'passed through' it, Word does not actually delete stuff in the file as you delete it, it just makes it not visible. Apart from bloating the file its pretty uncool on the security front if you are sending anyone copies of the file, ie someone with a text processor may be able to see the previously deleted (invoice) information.

It could be someone else knows of a way to remove the deleted content from a Word file, otherwise I recommend you create a Word template for your invoice.

regards Hugh

 

[MMJJLL]

Thanks Hugh

When I loaded the document into a text editor, it just gave me 4 pairs or question marks, but in did reduce the file down to 26 bytes! (albeit 4k on disk). So, still a bit of a mystery

 

[Madawc]

You could save it as text and then re-lead it from text. Of course you'll lose all your formatting, along with the 'bloat'.

Or you could make yourself a template invoice and keep copying it for each new invoice.

Madawc Williams (East Anglia, UK)

 

[macropod]

Hi MMJJLL,

It's possible the document has become corrupt, and that's causing the bloated file size.

Another thing that will increase the size is if you're embedding the fonts - check under Tools|Options|Save.

Yet another is saving the file in HTML or, possibly, rtf format. If you're usinf anything other than Word's doc format, try saving in Word's doc format instead.

Finally, try saving the file using File|Save As, but retaining the .doc format.

Cheers

 

[HughLerwill]

MMJJLL,

I just tested out what I said earlier with Word 2002 fully service packed;

1. Create a new word doc
2. Type some text into it
3. Save it, Close Word
4. Start Word, load the file
5. Erase the text previously entered
6. Save it, Close Word
7. Load file into NotePad
8. I can (still) see the erased text in NotePad

regards Hugh

 

[jblewis]

This sounds like what templates(.dot) are for.

JBLewis