The Perils of Updating Your Word Processing Software
I published the fifth book in my Det. Louis Martelli, NYPD, series, Eight Circle, in 2014, on CreateSpace (CS), and hadn’t paid much attention to the text until a few days ago. Then, by chance, in scanning a portion for an idea I had regarding a Flash Fiction piece I was writing, I came across a typo (the horror!). Should be an easy fix, says I, plunging in and correcting the problem where it appeared (two places).
But when I resubmitted the revised text to CS for approval, back it came, UNAPPROVED. The problem: incorrect pagination.
What? Sure enough, not only did some of the chapters now start on even pages, but also, the page numbers near the end, in a separate section, had jumped by more than 200. What was going on?
The problem lay in the purchase of a new computer and attendant software in late 2015. This resulted in my now using a new version of MS Word. So, when I now saved the corrected version of the book, the computer upgraded the text to the newer version of Word.
Truth be told, I was given the option of saving the file in an earlier version of Word, and, on hindsight, I should have done so. But, after an hour’s work (and the loss of a few hairs), the problem was resolved.
Please take note of this the next time you rework a manuscript. Be careful when saving files to ensure you don’t accidentally incur problems by your having changed versions of the word processing program you’re using.
But when I resubmitted the revised text to CS for approval, back it came, UNAPPROVED. The problem: incorrect pagination.
What? Sure enough, not only did some of the chapters now start on even pages, but also, the page numbers near the end, in a separate section, had jumped by more than 200. What was going on?
The problem lay in the purchase of a new computer and attendant software in late 2015. This resulted in my now using a new version of MS Word. So, when I now saved the corrected version of the book, the computer upgraded the text to the newer version of Word.
Truth be told, I was given the option of saving the file in an earlier version of Word, and, on hindsight, I should have done so. But, after an hour’s work (and the loss of a few hairs), the problem was resolved.
Please take note of this the next time you rework a manuscript. Be careful when saving files to ensure you don’t accidentally incur problems by your having changed versions of the word processing program you’re using.
No comments have been added yet.
