Track Changes "Card"

Question

I am editing a journal and have a document that used tracked changes. After accepting the changes, there are several problems. A good portion of the text are now in 'text field boxes' and it has also inserted unwanted spaces where words/phrases were changed. How do I turn this back into a 'normal'document without 'text/field' boxes?

Answer 1

Thanks for the screen shot. I repeat a part of it below. Notice the three dots at the top corner of the "boxed" text range? It indicates that the content is inside a content control.

The quickest way to get rid of these content controls is to save a copy of the document, using File > Save As > Browse, choosing the older Word 97–2003 (*.doc) format in the process.

You can then convert the *.doc file back to *.docx.

Note that the conversion from *.docx to *.doc will get rid of some other features that are not supported in the older file format. Therefore, you should keep a copy of the original *.docx file just in case.

Answer 2

In most cases, when content controls show up and you didn't create them intentionally, the controls have been inherited from the document template.

Maybe you used one of Word's built-in templates? Some of them contain content controls as placeholders.

Answer 3

I've tried creating the macro and it doesn't run.

Answer 4

Thanks for your reply, but this doesn't really help. The whole 27 page academic article has been turned into multiple text boxes just from using the track changes function. This would take me hours to cut and paste. I might as well retype it.

I really can't belive that the answer to this is for me to create a macro. Shouldn't this be built into the programme as the new track changes card system has created this problem?

Answer 5

Hello Kate,

Welcome to the Microsoft Community.

As for your information, I understand you have some issues with removing the text/field boxes in your Word document. Here's three ways to remove the textboxes:

Copy & Paste: Copy the text from the text box, and click on outside areas, then paste the texts. Then click on the border of the textboxes, this makes you to select them, and press Del key.

Using the Selection Pane + WordPad:

You can find the Selection Pane in [Home] tab -- [Editing] (on the right) -- Select

And you can see all the text boxes in the selection pane on the right side of Word window. Select all of them by press and holding Ctrl key while clicking on the Text boxes, press Ctrl+C, then open WordPad program which is readily available on your computer. 

Press Ctrl+V to paste. You'll get the texts inside the text boxes.

Using Macros:

Notice: This method involves a bit more technical steps. This method will be useful when you have a large number of text boxes in the document. If you are not familiar with macros, I recommend you backup your file before you try.

On your document, go to the View tab, then click on the Macros button. This will show the Macros dialogue box in the middle of your screen. Type a name for the macro in the Macro namefield. For this example, we’ll use the name DeleteTextBox. Make sure that there aren’t any spaces between the words. Then, click the Createbutton.

You will be directed to the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications, a.k.a. VBA, on a new window. This is where we’ll create the macros for our document. Note that this is a different window than your MS Word.

Create the macro by simply copying the VBA code below. We’ve secured this VBA code for you from an online resource.

Sub DeleteTextBox() 

Dim RngDoc As Range, RngShp As Range, i As Long 

With ActiveDocument 

For i = .Shapes.Count To 1 Step -1 

  With .Shapes(i) 

  If .Type = msoTextBox Then 

  Set RngShp = .TextFrame.TextRange 

  RngShp.End = RngShp.End - 1 

  Set RngDoc = .Anchor 

  RngDoc.Collapse wdCollapseEnd 

  RngDoc.FormattedText = RngShp.FormattedText 

.Delete 

  End If 

End With 

Next 

End With 

End Sub   

On the VBA window, select all the content in the Normal – NewMacros (code) window and press the Deletekey on your keyboard.

Then, paste the code you copied above.

Click the Savebutton found in the toolbar just below the Mainmenu. 

After these process above, switch back to your Word window and click on the Macrosbutton again. On the Macrosdialogue box, select the macro DeleteTextBox then click the Run button.

Switch back to your MS Word window and click on the Macrosbutton again. On the Macrosdialogue box, select the macro DeleteTextBox then click the Run button.

This will delete all the text boxes in your Word document while preserving all the text in it. 

I hope you find the above information helpful. If you need any further assistance, please let me know and I'll provide more advice.

Best Regards,

William Yu | Microsoft Community Support Specialist