Microsoft Word – problems re-opening files containing charts

The following bug has been brought to our attention today. Some files created in MS Word 2007, which have charts pasted in from Excel, cannot be reopened by other users because the chart corrupts the file. This results in the following error when you attempt to open the file:

According to Microsoft website this is a known issue with Office 2007. You can see more details about this on Microsoft’s support website.

This error has affected some tutors wanting to download student assignments that have been submitted through NILE. For files submitted to Turnitin, there is a workaround for this, which is to choose to download the submitted files in PDF format rather than the original (.docx) format. You may also be able to open the files using Word 2010 if you have access to this. Please note that this bug does not seem to affect those using the online grading tool (Grademark).

We would also recommend that any members of staff asking students to submit files containing charts should advise them to convert their file to PDF (e.g. using the Save As PDF option in Word) before submitting it.

If you encounter this error and would like advice, please contact the Learning Technology team.