TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Subject:Question on illustrations created in Word From:"L. Burnham O'Donald" <lodonald -at- PRIMENET -dot- COM> Date:Tue, 15 Apr 1997 16:00:32 -0400
I have a question on illustrations that I'm pretty sure were created in
Word, with Word's built-in picture application.
The illustration I'm concerned with came in a text file supplied by a
client. When I double-click on the figure, it "opens" and a drawing
toolbar appears. I can make changes all right, but the problem is that
all the formatting done by the author falls apart: text that was rotated
90 degrees is now horizontal; lines that were previously hidden are now
visible, etc. I've tried to click on individual items and "send to back"
(and "send to front" or whatever) etc. and nothing seems to work. (I
know how to create figures in this application and how to group and
ungroup; the author's stuff wasn't grouped, FWIW.)
I wasted an hour on the phone with Microsoft -- the tech support person
claims he, and his cohorts and their database, has never seen this
problem before.
This is _not_ the first time I've run into this problem, although
admittedly I don't work too much with illustrations. But it's the first
time I've called Microsoft on it, and it's the first time I'm darned if
the solution is for me to redo everything, which is what I've done in
the past as a workaround.
My feeling is that perhaps the figure was created on a Mac while I'm on
a PC. Or, possibly the author didn't create everything "correctly" and
maybe that's what's causing the formatting to fall apart.
Any suggestions, or explanations?
Oh so many TIA.
Louise O'Donald
lodonald -at- primenet -dot- com
TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot- Send commands
to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/ or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html