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#1
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Word 2003 Tracked Changes
Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops
found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#2
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Hi Ofisteqi,
If you never turn on Tracked Changes in the Tools menu for a particular document, the changes won't be tracked in that document. That's all there is to that. If you do turn on Tracked Changes, you must have a purpose in doing so -- you want someone else (or yourself later on) to see what was changed. Or you received the document from someone else who intended that. The feature is primarily for sharing and reviewing information in a workgroup. Once you do track changes, they stay in the document until you remove them. The procedure given in that article isn't complicated. It boils down to this: "If you want to send a document that has tracked changes, and you don't want the recipient to see them, then use the Accept All button on the Reviewing toolbar." As the article is written, it takes into account the possibilities that (a) the toolbar might not be visible when you start, (b) some of the options might have been turned off, and (c) you might want to remove some changes and not others. If you're worried about stuff being hidden in Word documents, get the hidden-data-remover add-in from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=834427. This stuff isn't rocket science. For someone who alludes to being an "Office Techie" it shouldn't even be worth commenting about. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#3
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"Turning off" Track Changes is easy. The problem is that many users don't
realize that turning off tracking merely causes Word to stop tracking the changes; it doesn't remove the change tracking that has already been added to the document. To do that, you have to *accept* the changes. To do this in Word 2002/2003, you click the arrow beside the Accept Change button on the Reviewing toolbar and choose Accept All Changes in Document. You can delete all comments the same way (using the Reject Change menu). That said, documents can contain other sorts of "metadata" such as user information. Recent versions of Word make this quite easy to remove (there's a setting on the Security tab of Tools | Options). If you want to be sure of removing as much personal information from the file as possible, get the Hidden Data Remover tool at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. "Ofisteqi" wrote in message ... Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#4
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Jeez Jay,
You didn't have to personalize your response. If I was a true Office Techie like you, I would have gotten an MVP certification and the big bucks that comes with that title. Try not to forget what it was like when you were learning all this stuff. As Suzanne stated in her reply, there are multiple settings to configure because this 'feature' is turned on by default. That's why this configuration is so confusing, because of the multiple steps that are required to simply turn it off. I understand why the feature is available, because in some applications, it would be very useful. But when you push this software out to 10k desktops, one overlooked setting like this generates alot of support calls. Those that share documents with outside vendors want this information striped out for legal reasons and that's why I asked in the first place. I'm creating a 'cheat sheet' with instructions and unfortunately, one setting doesn't remove everything. Thanks for your prompt replies. It's appreciated. Ofisteqi wannabe...because I started out in this field with WordPerfect 5.0 and I miss it's simplicity...sniff. "Jay Freedman" wrote: Hi Ofisteqi, If you never turn on Tracked Changes in the Tools menu for a particular document, the changes won't be tracked in that document. That's all there is to that. If you do turn on Tracked Changes, you must have a purpose in doing so -- you want someone else (or yourself later on) to see what was changed. Or you received the document from someone else who intended that. The feature is primarily for sharing and reviewing information in a workgroup. Once you do track changes, they stay in the document until you remove them. The procedure given in that article isn't complicated. It boils down to this: "If you want to send a document that has tracked changes, and you don't want the recipient to see them, then use the Accept All button on the Reviewing toolbar." As the article is written, it takes into account the possibilities that (a) the toolbar might not be visible when you start, (b) some of the options might have been turned off, and (c) you might want to remove some changes and not others. If you're worried about stuff being hidden in Word documents, get the hidden-data-remover add-in from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=834427. This stuff isn't rocket science. For someone who alludes to being an "Office Techie" it shouldn't even be worth commenting about. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#5
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I think you have misunderstood our response. It sounds as if your solution
is to turn off the setting to display markup automatically. This is dangerous! If there is hidden markup in a document, you *want* users to be able to see it! That is the reason the setting is on the Security tab. Hiding the markup is not the same as removing it. Also, FWIW, MVPs are not paid. We're all volunteers. -- Suzanne S. Barnhill Microsoft MVP (Word) Words into Type Fairhope, Alabama USA Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. "Ofisteqi" wrote in message news Jeez Jay, You didn't have to personalize your response. If I was a true Office Techie like you, I would have gotten an MVP certification and the big bucks that comes with that title. Try not to forget what it was like when you were learning all this stuff. As Suzanne stated in her reply, there are multiple settings to configure because this 'feature' is turned on by default. That's why this configuration is so confusing, because of the multiple steps that are required to simply turn it off. I understand why the feature is available, because in some applications, it would be very useful. But when you push this software out to 10k desktops, one overlooked setting like this generates alot of support calls. Those that share documents with outside vendors want this information striped out for legal reasons and that's why I asked in the first place. I'm creating a 'cheat sheet' with instructions and unfortunately, one setting doesn't remove everything. Thanks for your prompt replies. It's appreciated. Ofisteqi wannabe...because I started out in this field with WordPerfect 5.0 and I miss it's simplicity...sniff. "Jay Freedman" wrote: Hi Ofisteqi, If you never turn on Tracked Changes in the Tools menu for a particular document, the changes won't be tracked in that document. That's all there is to that. If you do turn on Tracked Changes, you must have a purpose in doing so -- you want someone else (or yourself later on) to see what was changed. Or you received the document from someone else who intended that. The feature is primarily for sharing and reviewing information in a workgroup. Once you do track changes, they stay in the document until you remove them. The procedure given in that article isn't complicated. It boils down to this: "If you want to send a document that has tracked changes, and you don't want the recipient to see them, then use the Accept All button on the Reviewing toolbar." As the article is written, it takes into account the possibilities that (a) the toolbar might not be visible when you start, (b) some of the options might have been turned off, and (c) you might want to remove some changes and not others. If you're worried about stuff being hidden in Word documents, get the hidden-data-remover add-in from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=834427. This stuff isn't rocket science. For someone who alludes to being an "Office Techie" it shouldn't even be worth commenting about. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#6
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Hi Ofisteqi,
Sorry if I sounded abrupt. Probably I should have thrown in a smiley or two. The "big bucks" comment certainly gets a grin here. Believe it or not, I do this 'cause I like to -- my wife wonders why I "help Bill for free"... I think there's still some confusion floating around here. The Track Changes feature is definitely not turned on by default, and neither is the Comments feature. Both of them need positive action by the user to start putting stuff into a document. Once there are both tracked changes and comments in the document, then yes, it takes a couple of steps to remove them -- or you can run the Hidden-Data Removal tool. The "Warn before..." setting in Tools Options Security can help you remember that you have stuff to remove, and I believe you can use Group Policy to set that option. Yeah, I remember WordPerfect 5.1 fondly -- but it wasn't all that simple. Remember the huge wad of printer drivers you had to keep around? Remember having a plastic strip attached to your keyboard with a 4-level legend of all the function keys? (Actually, I still have one of those, and I use the back of it for mainframe access functions. g) -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Jeez Jay, You didn't have to personalize your response. If I was a true Office Techie like you, I would have gotten an MVP certification and the big bucks that comes with that title. Try not to forget what it was like when you were learning all this stuff. As Suzanne stated in her reply, there are multiple settings to configure because this 'feature' is turned on by default. That's why this configuration is so confusing, because of the multiple steps that are required to simply turn it off. I understand why the feature is available, because in some applications, it would be very useful. But when you push this software out to 10k desktops, one overlooked setting like this generates alot of support calls. Those that share documents with outside vendors want this information striped out for legal reasons and that's why I asked in the first place. I'm creating a 'cheat sheet' with instructions and unfortunately, one setting doesn't remove everything. Thanks for your prompt replies. It's appreciated. Ofisteqi wannabe...because I started out in this field with WordPerfect 5.0 and I miss it's simplicity...sniff. "Jay Freedman" wrote: Hi Ofisteqi, If you never turn on Tracked Changes in the Tools menu for a particular document, the changes won't be tracked in that document. That's all there is to that. If you do turn on Tracked Changes, you must have a purpose in doing so -- you want someone else (or yourself later on) to see what was changed. Or you received the document from someone else who intended that. The feature is primarily for sharing and reviewing information in a workgroup. Once you do track changes, they stay in the document until you remove them. The procedure given in that article isn't complicated. It boils down to this: "If you want to send a document that has tracked changes, and you don't want the recipient to see them, then use the Accept All button on the Reviewing toolbar." As the article is written, it takes into account the possibilities that (a) the toolbar might not be visible when you start, (b) some of the options might have been turned off, and (c) you might want to remove some changes and not others. If you're worried about stuff being hidden in Word documents, get the hidden-data-remover add-in from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=834427. This stuff isn't rocket science. For someone who alludes to being an "Office Techie" it shouldn't even be worth commenting about. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
#7
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Jay,
You're forgiven. I know MVP's are volunteers and that's why I'm not one of them! I do have to agree with your wife though, smiles. Thanks for the assistance. Our end users have locked down permissions on their desktops, so adding a utility like you mention, isn't feasible. But now that I know about it, I can suggest it to Corp. Happy Holidays. "Jay Freedman" wrote: Hi Ofisteqi, Sorry if I sounded abrupt. Probably I should have thrown in a smiley or two. The "big bucks" comment certainly gets a grin here. Believe it or not, I do this 'cause I like to -- my wife wonders why I "help Bill for free"... I think there's still some confusion floating around here. The Track Changes feature is definitely not turned on by default, and neither is the Comments feature. Both of them need positive action by the user to start putting stuff into a document. Once there are both tracked changes and comments in the document, then yes, it takes a couple of steps to remove them -- or you can run the Hidden-Data Removal tool. The "Warn before..." setting in Tools Options Security can help you remember that you have stuff to remove, and I believe you can use Group Policy to set that option. Yeah, I remember WordPerfect 5.1 fondly -- but it wasn't all that simple. Remember the huge wad of printer drivers you had to keep around? Remember having a plastic strip attached to your keyboard with a 4-level legend of all the function keys? (Actually, I still have one of those, and I use the back of it for mainframe access functions. g) -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Jeez Jay, You didn't have to personalize your response. If I was a true Office Techie like you, I would have gotten an MVP certification and the big bucks that comes with that title. Try not to forget what it was like when you were learning all this stuff. As Suzanne stated in her reply, there are multiple settings to configure because this 'feature' is turned on by default. That's why this configuration is so confusing, because of the multiple steps that are required to simply turn it off. I understand why the feature is available, because in some applications, it would be very useful. But when you push this software out to 10k desktops, one overlooked setting like this generates alot of support calls. Those that share documents with outside vendors want this information striped out for legal reasons and that's why I asked in the first place. I'm creating a 'cheat sheet' with instructions and unfortunately, one setting doesn't remove everything. Thanks for your prompt replies. It's appreciated. Ofisteqi wannabe...because I started out in this field with WordPerfect 5.0 and I miss it's simplicity...sniff. "Jay Freedman" wrote: Hi Ofisteqi, If you never turn on Tracked Changes in the Tools menu for a particular document, the changes won't be tracked in that document. That's all there is to that. If you do turn on Tracked Changes, you must have a purpose in doing so -- you want someone else (or yourself later on) to see what was changed. Or you received the document from someone else who intended that. The feature is primarily for sharing and reviewing information in a workgroup. Once you do track changes, they stay in the document until you remove them. The procedure given in that article isn't complicated. It boils down to this: "If you want to send a document that has tracked changes, and you don't want the recipient to see them, then use the Accept All button on the Reviewing toolbar." As the article is written, it takes into account the possibilities that (a) the toolbar might not be visible when you start, (b) some of the options might have been turned off, and (c) you might want to remove some changes and not others. If you're worried about stuff being hidden in Word documents, get the hidden-data-remover add-in from http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=834427. This stuff isn't rocket science. For someone who alludes to being an "Office Techie" it shouldn't even be worth commenting about. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Ofisteqi wrote: Is there a way to turn off Tracked Changes without going through the hoops found in this article? http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/as...983881033.aspx From what I've read about Tracked Changes, it appears that there is no way to 'shut off' this information from being hidden in the document. Of course, there are add-in for converting to .pdf etc, but why doesn't Word offer a setting (one setting and not confusing multiple settings stated in this article) to turn this 'feature' off. Can anyone explain what the purpose is of having changes tracked from Microsoft's viewpoint? With all of the press lately about legal issues and document retention and storage, there should be a way to shut this down without attending a training session. Thanks for your feedback. |
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