Bizarre file legacy problems

[ngazidja]

I'm having some very strange problems with a file that I am jointly working on with a colleague. It's a translation and we pass it to and fro so that each can make comments as we progress, but as we do so we have noticed that previous and superceded annotations (specifically text attributes such as strikethroughs, colour and bolding) regularly reappear. I can best explain the problem by giving an example:

In version 1, I write "the mountain of the island". In version two my colleague thinks "of the island" is superfluous and strikes it through. In version three, I remove the strikethrough, explaining that this is the expression used in the original and my colleague agrees. We move on, I continue to work on the file and send it back to her. She annotates and sends it back, and I notice she has again struck through the words "of the island". I ask he why, and she says she didn't. I remove the strikethrough, work on the file, send it back, when it comes back again "of the island" is again struck through. This has been going on for half a dozen exchanges of the document - every time I remove the strike through, it reappears when she sends it back to me despite her not having touched it. And it has happened with other pieces of text, too.

Any suggestions? This is, apart from anything else, very irritating, since I have to double confirm everything she does. Has anyone else had trouble with this sort of thing?

She's using a very recently purchased version of Microsoft Word (I know, I told her to buy Nisus about a day too late), on a Mac, I'm using NWP 1.4.2. We're using rtf.

[martin]

Hopefully we can figure out what's going awry here. But before we try to explain or diagnose this problem, some questions:

1. When you say "strikes it through" do you mean that she is using Track Changes and the text is deleted, or do you mean that she literally adds the strikethrough formatting (eg: the menu Format > Strikethrough > Single)?
2. From your description, it sounds like the strikethrough always reappears after she (and Word) edit/save the file. If she opens the exact file she sent to you, does the unwanted strikethrough show there (in Word) as well? Or, for a given file, is it just something that shows in Nisus Writer?

[ngazidja]

I'll check with her - I always use the formatting option, generally from the character panel in the tools window. She did once mention "Fast Track" - I had no idea what she meant and I asked her but she didn't reply.

[ngazidja]

She tells me that to strikethough a word she presses the delete key on her keyboard. I have no idea how this creates a strikethough rather than deleting the word - which, as a non-Word user, would be what I would logically expect... probably why I don't use Word

And the struckthough word from which I have removed the strikethough appears as normal in the version that she opens and it only appears as struckthrough again when I open (and Nisus converts) the file that she sends back to me (and remains struckthrough if I send it back to her again).

[ngazidja]

Ok, it appears that there is a "track option" mode in Word which allows the delete key to work as a strikethrough key, but which (I would imagine) is not actually formatting it as a strikethrough, nor deleting it. So when is is opened in Nisus the word is neither properly formatted as strikethough (since that's not what Word has done to it) nor deleted (since Word hasn't done that either...). I see it as struck through, and remove the formatting, but since for Word the word has not been formatted as strikethrough, my removing the strikethrough format has done nothing (from Word's point of view). So when the file is opened again in Word, I've done nothing to it (from Word's point of view) and the word remains "struckthough". And that's how it comes back to me again.

Unless I've misunderstood this

[martin]

Ok, it appears that there is a "track option" mode in Word which allows the delete key to work as a strikethrough key, but which (I would imagine) is not actually formatting it as a strikethrough, nor deleting it. So when is is opened in Nisus the word is neither properly formatted as strikethough (since that's not what Word has done to it) nor deleted (since Word hasn't done that either...).

Thanks for checking on that! So she is using Track Changes to mark the deletion. The problem is now clear: Nisus Writer 1.4.x does not have a Track Changes feature. So when it encountered a tracked deletion, it merely applies a red strikethrough character style to the text. So that's as expected now.

I would recommend that either she not use Track Changes (instead use regular formatting/styles to communicate changes), or you could upgrade to Nisus Writer 2.0, which has proper support for Track Changes.

I see it as struck through, and remove the formatting, but since for Word the word has not been formatted as strikethrough, my removing the strikethrough format has done nothing (from Word's point of view). So when the file is opened again in Word, I've done nothing to it (from Word's point of view) and the word remains "struckthough". And that's how it comes back to me again.

Unless I've misunderstood this

The situation is a bit convoluted But I'm not sure that explanation holds. Because NWP 1.4.x doesn't support track changes, it will strip that information when it resaves a file. So if you open a file with a tracked deletion, remove the strikethrough, resave, and then open that file in Word, the deletion should no longer have the strikethrough (or be marked via track changes). If you'd like to pursue this, perhaps you could send me an example document/snippet, where the text shows without strikethrough in NWP but with strikethrough in Word.

[ngazidja]

I think I should just upgrade

[martin]

Excellent- hopefully you'll also find some other new tools in 2.0 useful!