WD2000: Some Characters Not Supported in ScreenTips (211975)

SYMPTOMS

Special characters, such as the "smiley face" symbol or Greek characters, that are included as part of a comment, may not appear in the ScreenTip even though they are displayed correctly in the comment pane.

NOTE: The ScreenTip appears when you rest the pointer over the comment mark, which is shaded with light yellow.

CAUSE

The font selected for the ToolTip does not support this or similar characters. To locate the font selected for the ToolTip, point to Settings on the Windows Start menu, and click Control Panel. Double-click the Display icon, and then click the Appearance tab.

In Word, the Wingdings font is used to automatically render characters stored as AutoCorrect entries when Replace text as you type (on the Tools menu, click AutoCorrect and then click the AutoCorrect tab) is turned on. Note that other characters typed in other symbol fonts may be rendered incorrectly in ScreenTips.

WORKAROUND

To view all characters in a ScreenTip, avoid using symbol characters, and use characters supported by non-symbol fonts, such as Arial or Times New Roman.

NOTE: Not all characters that you insert using this workaround will appear correctly in the ScreenTip. Some characters appear correctly, some characters appear similar, some characters do not appear at all, and some characters appear as a square.

To work around this problem, insert the character from the Symbol dialog box. For example, the "sad face" character appears as ":|" in the ScreenTip when you use the following steps. (The "smiley face" character is displayed as a box in the ScreenTip when you use this method.)

On the Insert menu, click Comment.
In the Comment pane, type the text you want.
On the Insert menu, click Symbol.
In the Font list, select Wingdings, click the "sad face" character, and then click Insert.

For other symbols, such as general punctuation, accented characters, and letter-like symbols (for example, the trademark symbol), use the following steps:

On the Insert menu, click Comment.
In the Comment pane, type the text you want.
On the Insert menu, click Symbol.
In the Font list, select (normal text), click the character you want, and then click Insert.