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Subject:Re: Word 97: What do you do when Normal.dot dies? From:Beth Friedman <bjf -at- WAVEFRONT -dot- COM> Date:Mon, 29 Sep 1997 17:23:16 -0500
In our previous episode, Christopher Knight said:
> The best thing to do is to not store your styles etc. in normal.dot.
> Store them in another template, and attach that to your document files.
> A corrupted normal.dot is a sign of a Word macro virus. You must drive a
> stake thru the heart of both the corrupted normal.dot AND the document
> which brought the virus into your system. A good virus-catcher will do
> the latter. Good luck.
I'm afraid I disagree on a number of counts here.
1. An attached template is just as vulnerable to a macro virus as your
normal.dot. It's a lesser risk, since most of the variants of the
macro virus don't attack attached templates, but they certainly could.
2. There are many other causes of a corrupted normal.dot besides the
Word macro virus. The description I saw (printing problems and weird
characters, IIRC sounds much more like a truly corrupted document.
Word can do that all on its own without outside help, I regret to say.
3. You can use the organizer to transfer existing macros, styles,
toolbars, and macros from an infected document to a clean document.
Attach the infected document without opening it, and it's available to
the organizer.
I agree that a good virus-catcher is an excellent thing to have. Just
don't throw the baby (or the normal.dot) out with the bathwater until
you've salvaged all you can from it.
*********************************************************************
Beth Friedman bjf -at- wavefront -dot- com
"A civil war is such an awful bother.
We fought at Tewksbury and still ran out of mustard.
I wonder where my brother Richard is." -- John M. Ford
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