Forewarned is forearmed August 23, 2011
Posted by Jill (@bonnjill) in Tech tips.trackback
Now that I am working with Office 2010 I need to be aware of any potential problems. Did you know that there is a potential compatibility problem between Word 2007 and Word 2010? According to Microsoft, there is a defect in Word 2007 with regard to DOCX files exchanged between users of Word 2010 and Word 2007. Apparently some Word 2007 users have experienced problems in which spaces were “disappearing” when viewing or printing documents sent to them from users of Word 2010. There is apparently a defect in the file / open code of Word 2007 that causes the problem. This could be a problem if you are working in Word 2010 and deliver a DOCX file to your client who uses Word 2007. If your client reports this problem, the first thing you should ask them is if they have the latest patches for Word 2007 and/or Office 2007 Service Pack 2 installed. Of course, the best solution is to ask the client what version he/she uses and save the file in that format. After all, forewarned is forearmed…
Musings from an overworked translator 
Thanks for the heads up. Sometimes as I am merrily going about my business working on my computer someone sends me a document and when I open it there is definitely a problem. I forget that there may be a compatibility issue. I need to add checking periodically for Microsoft updates to my to do list.
Shirley
For a small subset of translators who works a lot with the Idiom CAT tool, please hold of on installing MS Office 2010 unless it’s absolutely necessary.
After upgrading to MS Office 2010, I have to wait more than a minute before an XLZ file would open in Idiom, whereas with MS Office 2007, it would take only a few seconds. To be sure, it’s just a minor annoyance, but why go there in the first place? Office 2007 is still perfectly capable anyway.
Ha, just seeing this now. I had a student last year who sent me a file with no spaces in it–we both wondered how that could be, so this must be it! Thanks:)