Hi Joe,
Last things first: Yes, you really should transfer this table to Excel. It
won't take long to learn enough Excel to maintain a simple table like that.
In the meantime, on the theory that the table structure is corrupted and
that your previous attempt failed to clear the corruption, try this on a
copy of the document:
Select the table and choose Table Convert Table to Text. Assuming you
don't have any tab characters inside the table, you can accept all the
defaults and just click OK. The table will be converted to plain text, with
a tab between each pair of former cell contents and a paragraph mark at the
end of each row. Now select that whole mess and choose Table Convert
Text to Table. As a sanity check, the numbers of columns and rows should be
the same as the old table. Click OK, save, and try sorting the table. If
everything seems OK, use the copy to replace your damaged original document.
--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP FAQ:
http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
Joe McGuire wrote:
I have run into this problem for the first time. I have a Word table
(about 355kb, about 180 lines/rows) which I have been updating for
2-3 years. It is actually a table matching legal cases with their
billing reference numbers, with 1 case per row. Some other
information about the case is also stored in the different cells
(columns) of each row, including the state where the case is pending.
The table is usually sorted alphabetically and maintained that way. I
usually make a copy of the table and sort it by state, but without
usually saving it as a separate table in the document. Suddenly I am
encountering this error message when I try to sort the whole table or
even a few rows: "Word cannot sort this table because all of its
rows are table headings." How the %^#(?!@ did all my rows become
table headings? I certainly have headings at the top of the table,
but they do not repeat on each page, and I certainly don't include
the table headings when sorting. I tried copying all but the last
few paragraphs of the document containing the table and pasting it
into a blank document in case the original had become corrupted, but
this seemed to make no difference. The problem appeared in Word 2002
(via MS Terminal Server) but I had the same trouble trying to sort
the table in Word 2003.
(Should I be using Excel for this??? I hope not. I keep meaning to
learn how to use it but I have this naaasty habit of sticking with
what I know)