Can't delete text box in PowerPoint

Anonymous
2014-02-06T06:17:02+00:00

I've recently had a problem deleting text boxes in PowerPoint.  I'm able to select the box by clicking on the box perimeter (which changers the little circles and squares at the perimeter from open to solid, as it should).  But when I hit delete, it deletes the last text character within the box, rather than the box itself.  I also can't copy the box.   When I select the box and hit command-C, I hear a little whish, signifying (I suppose) an disallowed action.  The boxes in question are not part of a slide background.  This problem does not occur with pictures.

I've found a workaround which is to select the box differently, namely by dragging the cursor around the box with the mouse button held down.  Then I can (sometimes) delete or copy it.  Still looking for a real fix.

Microsoft 365 and Office | PowerPoint | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2014-04-15T21:34:15+00:00

I stumbled on a fix today.  

Under system preferences, chose Keyboard, then chose Shortcuts, and then at the bottom under Full Keyboard Access, click the "All controls" radio button. 

Previously, the "Text boxes and lists only" radio button was selected.  I can recreate the problem by clicking this other radio button, i.e. the fix is fully reversible.  I don't think I ever touched either of these buttons before yesterday.

I believe this fix completely resolves for me the issues with selecting text boxes in PowerPoint. 

Note that it's very puzzling that a system tabbing option should have anything to do with selecting text boxes in PowerPoint.  I expect there is still an underlying bug.

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-02-11T19:31:35+00:00

    Jim,

    I have no problem with text boxes in Word.  I've never used text boxes in Excel, but just gave them a try, and they seem to check out mostly okay also.  I say mostly because, although I can delete them without any hitch, I can't drag the box as a whole.  But perhaps that's normal in Excel, and I never use text boxes in Excel anyway, so that doesn't bother me.  (I have no problem dragging text boxes in Word or PowerPoint.)

    I'm wondering if the PowerPoint delete problem is somehow related to needing to double-click instead of single-click on the box perimeter.  Although I can't achieve a reliable work-around by double-clicking, it does work often enough that it seems possibly relevant.

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-02-12T03:25:13+00:00

    The issue is probably more related to the sensitivity setting on your mouse.

    When you click to grab the frame, an over sensitive mouse setting may cause the to move slightly and thus miss the frame. When double clicking works, it's because the sensitive mouse has once again moved on the second click.

    Go to System Preferences > Mouse and try experimenting with the settings.

    Hope this helps

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-02-12T05:24:27+00:00

    Rich,

    I don't think it can be a mouse setting in any normal sense, because I am not having any trouble selecting the box with a single click on the perimeter.  In other words, I'm not having trouble hitting the frame and lighting up the little squares and circles on the perimeter with a single click. The problem is that I don't get the expected respond to hitting the delete command when the box is (seemingly) correctly selected.

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  4. Anonymous
    2014-02-12T08:50:21+00:00

    Dear All,

    I'm experiencing the same problem since last Saturday. I worked with PP (mac version) on the 7th of February and all was right. I needed to finish a presentation within the next morning and to my surprise, text boxes stopped behaving. The symptoms are exactly the same as described by Ralph. Moreover:

    1. Whenever I'm creating a new presentation, PP makes me face an already selected title box. No "Click to add title" heading is there and the cursor is already blinking inside the box waiting for me to write text. This happens also when I'm adding a new slide to an existing set of slides and it even affects the old presentations which had no problems till date.
    2. Like Ralph, if I'm selecting a box, I cannot copy/delete it unless I click the mouse right button and select copy/delete or press ESC key.

    This bug (malware?) made me pay attention to the PP interface environment. In fact I noticed that by selecting a text box, the paragraph indentation button is being highlighted (it goes clickable from the regular frozen status) and this prevents me from being able to copy the box. By pressing ESC, that same button goes back to its frozen status and the box becomes copy-able/delete-able.

    So when selecting a text box, PP seems to enter spontaneously in "text mode" preventing the user to perform those operations not related to writing text.

    I tried to delete my PP preferences and this doesn't work. I have not tried a different user: it bothers me to create a new one when it's always me using this mac. I'm heading now towards a OSX + Office clean install. Office was there since the last two years, updated to version 14.3.9 (131030).

    This is really driving me crazy.

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