Document corrupted?

[LGSMEDI]

Hello,
I wrote my whole project using openoffice writer. Before sending it to my teacher I opened the file to check it one more and time and I got a ascII filter opetions window. When I select any of the options give all I get is some scrambled text like this:
#D#o#c#u#m#e#n#t#S#u#m#m#a#r#y#I#n#f#o#r#m#a#t#i#o#n###########8###ÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿÿ##################################################C#o#m#p#O#b#j#####################################################ÿÿ

I tried opening it with other word programs but nothing works.

Does anybody know how to fix this?

Thanks,
Alexander

[Phil]

Hi and welcome to the community!

Have you read the Forum Survival Guide?

What version of OpenOffice are you using, and which operating system are you working on?

In which file format did you save the document (.odt/.doc/.rtf)? Did you maybe change its file extension?

KR, phil

[Hagar Delest]

See in your OOo backup folder if there is a copy (Tools>Options>OOo>Paths will show you the path to the /backup folder).

As a basic rule, you should always work in native .odt format and export to .doc when needed.

Good luck.

[TheGurkha]

If your file is less than 128K attach here, and I'll take a look at it.

[LGSMEDI]

phil - I'm using OOo 2.1 with Windows Vista operating system
I always saved the files in doc format because i can open and print them in school.

hagar - I checked the back up folder and it did not have anything in it.

TheGurkha - the file is 182 kb

I uploaded a file on my friend's hosting site though
http://adriansdesigns.freehostia.com/CS ... ROJECT.doc

Any other suggestions are appreciated!

Alexander

[ken winston caine]

Same thing happened to me an hour ago. I am running Open Office 2.2 on a Windows XP machine and also save in "doc" format. Have never encountered this before.

When I attempt to open the file now, the ASCII filter options box pops up and asks me to choose one. No idea which one might work. The Western Euro one that has U.S. in it displays my file as nothing but 16 pages of asterisks.

Am grateful for Hager's advice to search for the path for a backup (Tools>Options>OOo>Paths). In my case there is a backup that still has its integrity. So 2-1/2 hours of work are salvaged. (Though it's taken me an hour of fiddling on my own and then visiting this forum to do it. Thanks to the good folks on the forum for being there.)

These search results (from this community forum) might help the original poster:
http://user.services.openoffice.org/en/forum/search.php

If that doesn't bring up 26 results for you, then go to the search box and type in "ascii filter" without the quotes and you'll get the results that I've been sorting through.

They helped me. Led me to this thread where I saw how to locate a backup of the file.

This apparently is a common problem and from what little I've studied so far, is common for those of us who want to work with complexly styled documents and who save them (while working with them) in the Microsoft doc format. It's apparently an unfortunate bug in Open Office. Maybe it will get worked out in a future release?

Best,
kwc

[Hagar Delest]

Any other suggestions are appreciated!

Note that you can also use a file sharing web site (like mediafire.com).

Back to your issue, I tried to open it even with MS Word 2003 and the file is indeed wrecked. But the content doesn't seem to be completely damaged. If you've access to applications that can recover damaged .doc files, it may be worth a try.

BTW, were you saving on your HD or thumbdrive?

And in the future, check the Tools>Options>Load/Save>General> Always create backup copy option.

[Phil]

I export writer documents to .doc from time to time, and I never encountered the problem that the file is corrupt.
I'm currently using version 2.4 and have used 2.3.1 before.
So I would recommend to upgrade to the current OOo version 2.4 in any case. It also has many improved or new features!

KR, phil

[TheGurkha]

@LGSMEDI - the file went down to 5K when it was zipped

But as Hagar said, it is very messed up. I would definitely upgrade to 2.4, always work in OOo format .odt and only when you need to give a copy to someone else save a version in .doc. That way you always have your .odt to go back to.

[foxcole]

Back to your issue, I tried to open it even with MS Word 2003 and the file is indeed wrecked. But the content doesn't seem to be completely damaged. If you've access to applications that can recover damaged .doc files, it may be worth a try.

The "Document Summary information" is in the trailer on a Word file, or so it is in the Word 2003 documents I created, but the trailer doesn't start with that bit, it starts several words earlier.

I didn't find any standard Word .doc file signature (at least of those listed here: http://www.aeicomputertech.com/forensic ... atures.php ) anywhere in this sample document, so it seems the header has been overwritten with part of a trailer somehow. The sample appears to have a standard trailer as well... but there's no telling where the trailer data at the top of the file came from. Could be from a different file altogether.

Unfortunately, I wouldn't think it's possible to just paste a header in... I'm not sure how you'd determine where the header should end and at what point the erroneous trailer data ends, since both can vary so much in the amount and kind of information they carry (including, for example, embedded fonts).

Hagar, do you believe there does exist a tool that can repair this information? Might you have a link or two?

This apparently is a common problem and from what little I've studied so far, is common for those of us who want to work with complexly styled documents and who save them (while working with them) in the Microsoft doc format.

Actually, it is not common. It only seems that way because you're searching a user-to-user forum and finding this issue. People who have no problems with the software do not post questions in such places, so what you see is a filtered, concentrated subset of OOo users. Even among that subset, only a small number are reporting this particular problem.

I work with complexly styled Word documents too, and have tested saving in .doc format while working. There are other reasons to avoid doing that, however, so I still recommend you do not. Work in the .odt format and save as .doc only at the end before you close the document for the day.

[Hagar Delest]

Hagar, do you believe there does exist a tool that can repair this information? Might you have a link or two?

I think a power user has already given a link in this forum but I don't remember who. I don't know about the trailer but from what we can see from the file, this is not just a whole bunch of '#' and Co. That's why I suppose we could recover something but that's just a guess. Usually, damaged files are much more wrecked.

[Cambirder]

Out of interest I tries a bunch of products on this file, unfortunately not one could recover the data. Some gave up the instant you hit the recover button, it made one program crash every time you tried it, one looked promising but hung after telling you it had repaired the header, and 2 would not even try unless you had Word installed.

Looks like a lost cause.

To avoid the problem in future save a copy in .odt format on your PC, and a back-up / school copy on a memory stick in .doc format.