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Mac Forum / Applications / Word / January 2006Date and time problems
Someone asked me about a problem they were having in Word 04, where if they started typing the date the autocomplete date that was generated was for the *previous* day's date. I started to compose an emailed reply about checking their system date, when I happened to check it myself. Sure enough, *I* was getting the wrong date! Right now (January 28th), if I start to type the date, Word fills in January 27. This happens whether I type "Janu" and accept the autocomplete screentip, then a space (and get the screentip with the date), or if I type "January" and a space (and get the month and date in the screentip). Entourage has the correct date highlighted in its calendar. What's going on?  Signatureto respond (OT only), change "spamless.invalid" to "optonline.net" <http://www.thecoffeefaq.com/> > Someone asked me about a problem they were having in Word 04, where if > they started typing the date the autocomplete date that was generated [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > space (and get the screentip with the date), or if I type "January" and > a space (and get the month and date in the screentip). Works fine here. But in fact I don't use this feature (I'm turning it back off now). To insert the date, choose Insert > Date and Time. m. Signaturematt neuburg, phd = matt@tidbits.com, http://www.tidbits.com/matt/ Tiger - http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/tiger-customizing.html AppleScript - http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0596005571 Read TidBITS! It's free and smart. http://www.tidbits.com Hi, Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open Word on the 27th and you do not quit it at some point, it will keep using that date, whether it's the 27th or the 28th (or any other day after that). The solution is, you may have guessed it by now, to quit Word and relaunch it at the beginning of every day, so that it picks up the new date. On 28.01.06 15:52, in article heimdall-467269.10521328012006@individual.net, > Someone asked me about a problem they were having in Word 04, where if > they started typing the date the autocomplete date that was generated [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] > > What's going on? > Hi, > Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open > Word on the 27th and you do not quit it at some point, it will keep using > that date, whether it's the 27th or the 28th (or any other day after that). > The solution is, you may have guessed it by now, to quit Word and relaunch > it at the beginning of every day, so that it picks up the new date. Which, you gotta admit, is a brain-damaged design bug. Who cares when you started Word? What could be more irrelevant? I know that I might leave it runing for weeks. Anyhow, by properly using the appropriate date field, you can safely ignore this lack of cytocholine. You get a choice of create date, save date or current date. The latter does update as time passes. All you have to do is update fields. SignatureTo de-mung my e-mail address:- fsnospam$elliott$$ PGP Fingerprint: 1A96 3CF7 637F 896B C810 E199 7E5C A9E4 8E59 E248 >> Hi, >> Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > > Which, you gotta admit, is a brain-damaged design bug. Not that it isn't a problem now, but it isn't a brain-damaged design bug, it's a design decision made back in the days when you had to shut down a computer every day anyhow. In fact, I'd say that Office 2004 is the first version that people might be running for more than a day at time, based on comments made about Word X being a little glitchy, and that fact that I don't recall this complaint coming up until recently (in both Word and Entourage). Obviously it needs to be changed now. Daiya > Who cares when you started Word? What could be more irrelevant? > I know that I might leave it runing for weeks. [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > You get a choice of create date, save date or current date. The latter > does update as time passes. All you have to do is update fields. > >> Hi, > >> Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > > Obviously it needs to be changed now. Nope. It was always a very poor assumption that your computer was so unreliable that it had to be rebooted every day. Almost certainly somebody cut a corner that said you could rely on a date read at start up, beacause that was easier than going out to the OS when the user asked for a date. That was a brain-damaged design bug. No argument. Fifteen years ago I was shipping systems that expected never to be shut down. We had uptimes measured in years and years on some of our sites. The most common reason for restarting was the failure of the Uninterrptible Power Supply at the client's premises. This hopeless toy computer mentality is still with us. The whole world is pockmarked with people that never knew any better. SignatureTo de-mung my e-mail address:- fsnospam$elliott$$ PGP Fingerprint: 1A96 3CF7 637F 896B C810 E199 7E5C A9E4 8E59 E248 > Nope. It was always a very poor assumption that your computer was so > unreliable that it had to be rebooted every day. [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > > That was a brain-damaged design bug. No argument. Mmm. Actually, I just checked and this one was coming up before Office 2004. But JE suggested in one thread that it only applies to using AutoComplete to insert the date, because the AutoText is loaded on startup, but that other date queries do check the system for the current date. And I guess that's what Matt implied in his early post in this thread. I can't test it very well because I tend to quit apps frequently and never use AutoComplete anyhow. Daiya > > Nope. It was always a very poor assumption that your computer was so > > unreliable that it had to be rebooted every day. [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > I can't test it very well because I tend to quit apps frequently and never > use AutoComplete anyhow. That's right. Fields do the right thing. SignatureTo de-mung my e-mail address:- fsnospam$elliott$$ PGP Fingerprint: 1A96 3CF7 637F 896B C810 E199 7E5C A9E4 8E59 E248 I agree. It's very definitely a "bug" -- the only thing we could possibly discuss is which of several Microsoft employees' brains was the site of the damage. The fact that the bug doesn't exist in the PC product tends to narrow down the field of likely suspects a bit. A bug is "When an error means software does not do what the user wants". It makes no difference who made the error, it's still a bug. The fact that this one was produced by laziness and is maintained by stupidity does not alter the fact. It's a bug. The fact that they won't change the five lines of code needed to fix it shows us exactly how much of an investment they are prepared to make in us, their customers. Do I know for sure that it's only "five lines of code"? Of course I don't. But if it involved any more than that, I definitely would not want to be the ones explaining "why" to Microsoft Chief Software Architect Bill Gates. Cheers On 29/1/06 9:01 AM, in article 280120062201473068%nospam@yrl.co.uk, "Elliott Roper" <nospam@yrl.co.uk> wrote: >>>> Hi, >>>> Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open [quoted text clipped - 30 lines] > This hopeless toy computer mentality is still with us. The whole world > is pockmarked with people that never knew any better. SignaturePlease reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email me unless I ask you to. John McGhie <john@mcghie.name> Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410 > I agree. It's very definitely a "bug" -- the only thing we could possibly > discuss is which of several Microsoft employees' brains was the site of the > damage. > > The fact that the bug doesn't exist in the PC product tends to narrow down > the field of likely suspects a bit. It doesn't? I'm pretty sure I learned that Word picks up the AutoComplete date at launch from the WinWord newsgroups. Perhaps for older versions. Daiya > Hi, > Word picks up the system's date during the start up process. If you open > Word on the 27th and you do not quit it at some point, it will keep using > that date, whether it's the 27th or the 28th (or any other day after that). > The solution is, you may have guessed it by now, to quit Word and relaunch > it at the beginning of every day, so that it picks up the new date. Thanks for the answer; I hadn't thought it would be such a funky problem! :) Signatureto respond (OT only), change "spamless.invalid" to "optonline.net" <http://www.thecoffeefaq.com/> |
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