Word has to create temp files in the active folder whenever it opens or
saves a document. The size of the temp files vary with the complexity of the
document. Opening or saving from a floppy is bad for two reasons: Word is
trying to both read and write from a media that was introduced eons ago
(pre-1980s) and is desperately slow and not made for simultaneous read/write
activities; Word also has no idea if there is sufficient room on the floppy
and will overwrite other data if there isn't.

There is absolutely nothing to be gained from changing a file extension:
Word (as with most applications) will know that the document being opened is
not a Word Doc. Word will read the header data to determine which format it
is and use the appropriate converter (if installed) to convert it into Word
format. The extension is there for us rather than the application.

--
Terry Farrell - Word MVP
http://word.mvps.org/


"Michael R" wrote in message
...
: Graham Mayor wrote:
:
:
: Never ever read from, write to or print from floppy with Word. This is
the
: most certain method of ensuring document corruption. Copy to the hard
disc
: and work on the document from there.
:
:
: Just out of curiosity Graham, can you elaborate? I've heard similar
: tips from other Word gurus, but I've never been able to find out exactly
: why this is a bad idea.
:
: Also, when I rename a WP file with a .doc extension, Word opens it fine,
: but it does run some sort of converter first. Is that the filter you're
: speaking of? Thanks in advance for any advice
:
: Michael