Word Tip of the Day
Open a document without affecting other users' accessibility (2000/2001/2002)
Storing files in a network folder makes documents accessible to everyone in your office. However, Word draws the line on accessibility by limiting editorial access to one person at a time per document, on a first-come, first-served basis. If you attempt to open a document that's currently being accessed by another user, Word informs you that it's "locked for editing" by that user. You can either click Read-Only to view the original document without making changes to it, or you can click Notify to open the document in read-only mode and wait for notification that the other user has closed it (at which point you'll be able to click Read-Write and open the original copy for editing.)
But what if you want to view a document without preventing other people from editing it? Or what if two people need to make revisions to a document at the same time? You can do so easily by opening a copy of the original document. To do so, choose File | Open from the menu bar, or click the Open button on the Standard toolbar. In the Open dialog box, locate and select the document you'd like to access. Next, click the dropdown arrow next to the Open button, and choose Open As Copy from the resulting submenu. (In Word 2001, choose Copy from the Open dropdown list, and then click Open.) Word creates a copy of the original file in the same folder as the original. (Note: The Open As Copy option isn't available in Word 97. Instead, you can use the File | Save As command or a Microsoft Windows folder window to create a copy of the file.) Now you can view and make changes to the copy, while someone else can view and make changes to the original. (Note: You can easily compare the changes you made to the copy with the changes someone else made to the original using the Compare And Merge Documents feature, which we explained how to do in a recent tip.)
(Content provided by Element K Journals)
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