atw: Re: Microsoft word size limit?


Hi Dr Bill (P)

AFAIK, any limits on the size of a Word document
file are set more by the version of Word and the system resources of the
computer with which you are working.

On PC, if you avoid Word
97 like the plague that it was and work only with Word 2003 or higher on
Windows XP or higher, you will be pretty right for most things.

On the Mac, early versions of Word were pretty flaky but, I believe that
it has come of age these days on recent Mac environments.

That
said, I find file sizes are more limited by practicalities, such as
available space in the folder in which you must work (many folk are
allocated network folders for their working files that are severely
limited in space for storing graphics).  Also, network / LAN speed
can be an issue if you are dragging in big graphic files to open a
document.

I find that Word remains much more stable if you keep
its file sizes to < 5Mb.

Currently, I am creating a 350+
page manual on an Oracle HRMS / HR & Payroll "system" (for
lack of a better word for this glorified database with a shareware style
interface) that has many hundreds of graphics - all linked but not
embedded in the document.  The {INCLUDEPICTURE \d} does the trick
here.  It is running beautifully under Word 2003 on XP pro, apart
from the occasional grind to a halt when they back up the network drives,
which is not Word's fault at all.

The trick to keeping it
stable is to include but not embed the graphics, as above, back everything
up to ZIP files daily in case of file corruption (of the graphics or the
doc - all hard drives can fail) save manually and regularly.  (Turn
off auto save, it can crash word on big docs and turn off background
printing, which is a huge resource hog.)

Also, set the Word
file paths (also in Tools > Options) to where you store the graphics
and templates, to make things load properly.

Also, never run
Word for more than four hours at a time before saving and restarting it,
as this clears out its caches and keeps it stable. That said, maybe
once a week, open the file with Word's Open and Repair option (2003 and
higher) to fix any little nasties that creep in and clear out any
unintended copy and paste inserted OLE links, using the Insert >
Bookmark tool.

That said, single megabyte files should be an
absolute doddle.

Hope that helps.

Cheers,

Michael

-- 
Michael E. Granat 
Write Ideas
Carnegie, Victoria, Australia. 
E-mail: writeideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Web: www.writeideas.com.au 

20 Years of Write Ideas! 

Plain English Technical Communication. 
Advertising
Copywriting. 
Business Writing. 
Web & Direct Marketing
Content Writing. 


> Folks, 
> 
> 
> Is there a practical limit to the size of a Word document? 
> 
> I am being asked to compile a series of SOPs for a lab
that cover 9 
> areas of work each with several sub sections. The
aim is to have one 
> document on-line and that has a complete
index to all sections. A 
> few of the documents are already 1MB
in size. 
> 
> 
> Any advice welcome. 
>

> Bill 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Dr Bill
Parker 
> Editor "Solar Progress" ON-LINE 
> The
ANZSES Journal 
> Box 322 Mount Lawley 6929 Australia 
>
Phone 08 9272 9955 0403 583 676 
>
http://www.sustainablehouseday.com 
> http://www.anzses.org

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