auto text, why won't it work or only works sporadically ...

Anonymous
2010-10-24T20:58:44+00:00

moved from word 2000 to word 2010 and now auto text which was copied over works only occasionally and randomly ... i have done the word 2010 tutorial ... googled ad nauseum about it and i can not figure it out ... in word 2000 i added the auto text and when typing a document if i started typing the words of the auto text a greyish box showed up with the entire text, i hit enter and kept typing ... it is hit or miss whether the box will show up ... i have tried adding new auto text and that does not work at all ... what am i doing wrong ???

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  1. Stefan Blom 352.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-17T19:23:57+00:00

    Well, the AutoText feature has been redesigned and expanded into a more complex feature, called Building Blocks, and AutoComple suggestions have been removed (in Word 2007) and then reintroduced (in Word 2010), which explains why issues may occur.

    Note that AutoComplete only works if it can uniquely identify the entry whose name you are starting to type. Naturally, with a lot more entries to choose from, this is a more difficult task in Word 2010 than it used to be in Word 97-2003. Also, remember the limitations: entries must be in Normal.dotm or in the template attached to the current document for AutoComplete to work.

    Also, as Charles stated, you are not communicating directly with Microsoft in these forums, unless a person has the "Microsoft employee" title (in the Help section, see "Who's who in the forums?").

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  2. Charles Kenyon 170.9K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-17T19:08:36+00:00

    No one reading your comments here can fix anything at Microsoft. We are your fellow users.

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  3. Stefan Blom 352.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2012-01-03T19:08:32+00:00

    Following Graham's test results, did you make sure that your AutoText / Building Block names do not contain numeric characters?

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  4. Stefan Blom 352.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2011-12-26T15:55:03+00:00

    Thank you for the testing/clarification/extra work over Christmas. :-)

    I haven't had the time to test this yet, but I vaguely recall a problem in the past with numeric characters in Building Block names.

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  5. Stefan Blom 352.6K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2011-12-25T23:13:58+00:00

    Well, based on the (admittedly simple) testing I've done so far, I don't see it...

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