Print Preview magnification settings do not stick

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Joseph Rottenberg - 22 Nov 2004 21:26 GMT

I've been using MS Word for many years (now using Word 2000), and I'm
sure that when I used print preview in the past, the view was either
100% or Page Width. Recently, however, print preview opens at 50%, and
no matter what I do and how many ever times I change it and save the
file (even the template), it always opens at 50%. I can't be sure
whether this started happening when I got my new laptop (with XP Pro,
vs. Windows 2000 on my old laptop), or when I installed SP2, or none
of the above, but it definitely hasn't always been that way.
Now I've seen quite a few posts on this subject, and each time one of
the MVP's responds to the effect that MS Word opens at the Zoom ratio
last used. Well, it doesn't, at least not for everyone. Others have
suggested writing a macro to replace the built-in Print Preview, but
that sounds like a hassle. Has this behavior been acknowledged as a
problem by MS?

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Suzanne S. Barnhill - 22 Nov 2004 21:35 GMT

Let's just say that Word *used* to preserve the previously used settings in
the application, in documents, and in specific views such as Print Preview.
This has become gradually less dependable, and if you care enough about it,
the only way to ensure consistency is to use a macro.

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Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
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> I've been using MS Word for many years (now using Word 2000), and I'm
> sure that when I used print preview in the past, the view was either
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> that sounds like a hassle. Has this behavior been acknowledged as a
> problem by MS?

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Joseph Rottenberg - 23 Nov 2004 16:02 GMT

> Let's just say that Word *used* to preserve the previously used settings in
> the application, in documents, and in specific views such as Print Preview.
> This has become gradually less dependable, and if you care enough about it,
> the only way to ensure consistency is to use a macro.

OK. Thanks for your response. I coded the macro and it seems to do the
trick. But I'm still curious as to the point at which it stopped
sticking - was it XP or SP2? Because the version of Word (2000) that
I'm using is the same that I've had for a while. Also, does Microsoft
acknoweldge this to be a problem, or is this "behavior by design"? I
don't have a problem with Print Preview always opening to the same
magnification (and not the last one used), so long as I'm the one that
decides what that zoom level should be.

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Suzanne S. Barnhill - 23 Nov 2004 17:03 GMT

I'm not sure when the rot set in, but it certainly seems to be getting
progressively worse. I skipped Word 2000, so can't speak to that, but I
still think it probably started with the introduction of SDI. I have noticed
that settings I change in one document seem to be inherited by the next
opened in the same "window" (that is, if I have one document open, then open
a second, make changes in the Zoom, and close it, then the next document I
open may have the same Zoom setting even though that's not what was saved
with the document). What's really driving me crazy right now is the ruler. I
noticed that it was being displayed in Print Preview (where I don't need it,
and it takes up screen real estate), so I closed it. Usually such settings
apply only to Print Preview, but now I'm having the devil of a time getting
it to stay put in Normal or Print Layout view, and Word frequently opens
with different settings from the ones in effect when I closed it (no ruler,
Print Layout view instead of Normal, 105% Zoom instead of 100%, etc.).

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> > Let's just say that Word *used* to preserve the previously used settings in
> > the application, in documents, and in specific views such as Print Preview.
[quoted text clipped - 9 lines]
> magnification (and not the last one used), so long as I'm the one that
> decides what that zoom level should be.

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