WD97: Cannot Resolve Hyperlink That Contains Punctuation (164616)



The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Word 97 for Windows

This article was previously published under Q164616

SYMPTOMS

After you type a hyperlink, one of the following may occur when you click the hyperlink:
  • In Microsoft Word, you receive the following error message:
    Cannot open the specified file
    -or-
  • In Microsoft Outlook with Word set as your e-mail editor, when you click the hyperlink, nothing happens.

CAUSE

If you type certain punctuation marks with the hyperlink, Word incorrectly resolves the punctuation marks as part of the hyperlink.

The following punctuation marks are resolved incorrectly by Microsoft Word:

Character

Description

 

 

:

Colon

;

Semi-colon

)

Closing Parenthesis

!

Exclamation Point

WORKAROUND

To work around this problem, type a space between the hyperlink and the punctuation mark, or type the hyperlink on a separate line from the rest of the text and its punctuation.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article. This problem was corrected in Microsoft Word 2000.

MORE INFORMATION

You can enrich Web pages and Word publications that others read online by inserting hyperlinks to other items. The hyperlink can jump to a location in the current document or Web page, to a different Word document or Web page, or to a file that was created in a different program. You can even use hyperlinks to jump to multimedia files, such as sounds and videos. The destination the hyperlink jumps to can be on your hard disk, on your company's intranet, or on the Internet, such as a page on the World Wide Web. For example, you can create a hyperlink that jumps from a Word file to a chart in Microsoft Excel. A hyperlink is represented by a "hot" image or display text, which is often blue and underlined, that the reader clicks to jump to a different location.

Use the automatic formatting features for Word documents and Web pages when you know the addresses to jump to or when you have a document that contains file names or addresses that you want to format as hyperlinks. Use the Insert Hyperlink command to insert a hyperlink into Word files and Web pages when you aren't using the automatic formatting features or when you want to browse for the destination address. Use a drag-and-drop operation in Word files when you want to use the mouse to quickly create a hyperlink for text located within another Office file.

For more information about hyperlinks, click Contents and Index on the Help menu, click the Index tab in Microsoft Word Help, type the following text

hyperlinks, inserting

and then double-click the selected text to go to the "Create hyperlinks" topic. If you are unable to find the information you need, ask the Office Assistant.

Modification Type:MajorLast Reviewed:12/12/2002
Keywords:kbbug kbdta kbfield kbwdinternet word8 word97 KB164616