Word, Computers & Damaged Documents

[Edward Tomchin <gruff -at- BLUEHAWK -dot- COM>]

Hello to everyone,

I am new to this list but have, in that short time, noticed the difficulty
many seem to be having with large documents in MS Word + Win95.

While I am not running either (I've a dinosaur 386 w/Word Perfect 5.1), I do
have what might be an insurance solution to damaged or corrupted large
documents.  I use it and
while I've only had to call on it once (for a 176 page mms), it worked like
a charm and I only lost a little time.

Computers and software are what they are, which means from time to time they
will scramble data.  That is the nature of the beast.  If we are to use
computers, we must allow for their idiosyncracies in order to stay on top.

As I am creating any type of document, in addition to my regular backups, I
also create an ASCII file containing the text, and a duplicate of all
graphics used.  ASCII, being the generic end-all that it is, can be imported
back into any word processor, desktop publisher, database, or spreadsheet.
It is even transferrable between IBM & Mac.

Aside, I also create database entries using my word processor, then change
that data into ASCII delimited format with Word Perfect's ASCII Editor and
import it into my database.  The reason?  Editing is 1000% easier in a word
processor than in a database.

Well, that my two-bits.  Hope it helps someone.

________________
Edward A. Tomchin
gruff -at- bluehawk -dot- com
Las Vegas, NV
(702) 382-1109

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