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I am a copyeditor, which means I use the track changes function all the time. Since I switched to Word 2013 I've had a problem with some documents whereby after I close the document and open it again, the track changes function treats me as a new user. The problem with this is that I often go over any given bit of text several times, potentially making new changes each time, and when the system treats me as a new user, any earlier additions that I later delete show up in the margin as deleted text (rather than simply disappearing). This is confusing for my clients, who only want to see my final changes and not the history of my train of thought. Of course, I can resolve the problem by rejecting the change instead of deleting the added text, but (a) I don't always remember to do that, and (b) this is still awkward, especially where I rewrite a given bit of text several times, making new additions and deletions each time. Can anyone advise as to how I can alert the system that when I return to a document, it should treat previous tracked changes as still active? I know there must be a way to do this because the problem only arises with some documents. I suppose there is something about the settings in the original document as it is sent to me that affects this, but for the life of me I can't figure out what that is. Thanks to anyone who can help!
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To Rohn007: Yes, I am using the same USERID. There's no reason why it would change. But I see that under the user names there's a box for 'Always use these values regardless of sign in to Office'. This was unticked, and I've now ticked it. I'll see whether that makes a difference.
Thanks, Stefan. I'm going out of town for a couple of days, so I'll check this when I get back.
It does occur to me that I slightly misrepresented the problem. The system treats me as a different user at first (with a new color for my new edits), but as I go along and hit 'save', the color changes to the color of the old edits. So when I wrote 'Track changes function thinks I'm two people', that's not quite accurate. It's more that for some documents, the track changes function tracks my own editing history. I.e., it recognizes that I'm the same user (because ultimately it puts all my changes in the same color), but it still treats old changes as set somehow, so that deleting my old additions makes them show up as deletions.
As I said, I'll check what happens now that I've ticked that box when I return on Wednesday. Thanks.
Hi again Stefan,
I've been working on other projects and just got back to the one I was having trouble with.... and it seems that ticking the box for 'Always use these values regardless of sign-in to Office' does not fix the problem. So I'm still at a loss as to what to do.
As I said before, I slightly misrepresented the problem in my original post. The system treats me as a different user at first (with a new color for my new edits), but as I go along and hit 'save', the color changes to the color of the old edits. So when I wrote 'Track changes function thinks I'm two people', that's not quite accurate. It's more that for some documents, the track changes function tracks my own editing history. I.e., it recognizes that I'm the same user (because ultimately it puts all my changes in the same color), but it still treats old changes as set somehow, so that deleting my old additions makes them show up as deletions.
If you have any new ideas I'd be glad to hear them!
That should not be happening.
Please confirm that you are using the same USERID to access the file. The track changes mechanism is very simple (stupid).
Go into File menu > Options command > General option. Look at the value in "User Name". There should be a name entered there and it should not be changing between sessions. This is the name that is associated with the changes being tracked. Do you notice any difference in the names associated with the tracked changes?
Hi Stefan,
I'm having the same problem. I received a MS 97 - 2003 document from a customer that I am now editing. It's a legal contract that I need to send back to my customer, and we'll be going back and forth for many rounds to come. I spent six hours making changes yesterday, and when I closed and re-opened it (on the same PC, with the same login, within an hour or so), it now tracks my new edits as changes to the text I added earlier. It actually shows my same user name as two different individuals (and in two different colors). So, let's say I added a paragraph yesterday, and now today I want to delete it. When I delete it, it shows as struck-out text, it doesn't just disappear like I wanted it to. Saving and re-opening the document did not resolve the issue. My own items that I moved or deleted are still showing as moved or deleted. I also tried to save it as a Word 2013 document, but that didn't help either.
I have hundreds of minor modifications to make and I don't have time to go through accepting every tiny change. Ugh! I'm going crazy!
I really look forward to any insight you can provide from the MS team.