document loads but it is incomplete!!

Question

Hi i am so desperate. my phd thesis is 180Mb and 260 pages . i have it saved in 2 diff locations and numerous versions but not in the cloud.

Im using MSWord 2007 and Windows 8,    the document was created using MSWord 2010 and Windows 7.

The last version of the saved document loads in MSW2007 but it only loads 61 pages of the 260 pages.   The word count of the 61page document is about 20,000; this is found after i selected the entire 61 page doc and did a word count;  but the wordcount displays as 70,000 for the loaded 61 page incomplete document.  The word count of the original 260 page doc would be about 70,000 words.

The document map/ navigation pane shows the map of the entire document but it is inactive after the 61st page.

The file size as shown in Explorer is 180Mb and In the preview pane of Explorer, i can preview the whole 260 page document!    ive  tried Selecting (Ctrl-A) the complete document  in the preview pane in Explorer and then Ctrl-C Ctrl-V pasting it into a new doc; it appears to paste but only 61 pages show as earlier. ive tried opening a new document and doing Ctrl-W, then dragging the file ...again 61 pages show up.

An earlier version of the document loads the entire unedited ~250 pages.  The last version contains significant new material from the previous version which i dont have saved anywhere else  :(

thanks

Riyad

Answer 1

Try recreating it in a new document in Word 2007. Create a new blank file. Select the whole document, EXCEPT for the very last paragraph mark. Paste into the new blank file, save it as DOCX. When you subsequently open it in 2010, DO NOT convert to 2010 format. Keep it in 2007 format.  I am suggesting 2007 format because it is the lowest common denominator. No features have to be degraded when opening the file.

If that doesn't work, try save as to RTF format. That will keep much (but NOT ALL) of the formatting. Then Save As back to 2007 DOCX format.

Also stop switching between 2010 and 2007. Pick one and stick with it. Normally you can switch between the 2 versions with minimal impact. But apparently there is something specific about your document that cannot handle the repeated conversions.

Given the OP uses Word 2010, which does display all the content, using Word 2007 for the repair when it has problems displaying all the content is dumb advice. Likewise, copying all except the last (accessible) paragraph mark in Word 2007 is pretty useless if the content after that is inaccessible.

Your contention "no features have to be downgraded" by using the Word 2007 format is nonsense. Word 2010 makes numerous extra features available when working in its native mode that are not preserved in the Word 2007 format.

Furthermore, switching between versions is of no consequence if the document is in the earlier version's format. Only if the OP needs the features Word gives by working in Word 2010's native mode will working on the document in Word 2007 will have to stop.

Answer 2

Simple answer, "don't do that" ... (OK, it's not the answer).

I do recall a couple of other similar questions in this forum (good luck trying to find them ... <sigh> ) . I don't recall the solution.

Obviously you have a form of subtle document corruption.

Try recreating it in a new document in Word 2007. Create a new blank file. Select the whole document, EXCEPT for the very last paragraph mark. Paste into the new blank file, save it as DOCX. When you subsequently open it in 2010, DO NOT convert to 2010 format. Keep it in 2007 format.  I am suggesting 2007 format because it is the lowest common denominator. No features have to be degraded when opening the file.

If that doesn't work, try save as to RTF format. That will keep much (but NOT ALL) of the formatting. Then Save As back to 2007 DOCX format.

Also stop switching between 2010 and 2007. Pick one and stick with it. Normally you can switch between the 2 versions with minimal impact. But apparently there is something specific about your document that cannot handle the repeated conversions.

Answer 3

hi thanks... ive done as suggested. the missing pages do not appear.  ive inspected the document for hidden text...results state no hidden text was found.

Answer 4

Try clicking on the ¶ symbol on the Ribbon's Home tab to display the document's formatting marks, then do Ctrl-End. Do the 'missing' pages now appear? If so, the problem is that you've formatted some of the content as hidden text. Remove that attribute and everything should be fine.

Otherwise, you might need to restore the document from your most recent backup.